


Corpus Hominis

by mycapeisplaid



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Anal Sex, Blow Jobs, Case Fic, Fluff, Frottage, Humor, M/M, Massage, Rimming, Romance, Sexual Content, Silly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-09
Updated: 2013-12-29
Packaged: 2017-12-10 21:45:50
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 47,709
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/790501
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mycapeisplaid/pseuds/mycapeisplaid
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John knows the human body intimately.  He’s had plenty of opportunity for study as a doctor, soldier, and lover.  There’s one particular body, however, he knows very little about.  When Sherlock launches himself head-first into a new obsession and they get sent on a case in an unlikely location, the pair discovers each other’s bodies with confusing yet delightful (and sometimes hilarious) results.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Русский available: [Corpus Hominis](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1555676) by [Rishima_Kapur](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rishima_Kapur/pseuds/Rishima_Kapur)



> “Corpus Hominis” is my first foray into the Sherlock fandom. I hope they let me run with the big dogs.
> 
> I have to offer BettySwallocks a ton of thanks for Britpicking and for sticking with me as I write this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  
> 
> FABULOUS cover art by MOONBLOSSOM

Chapter 1

“And if the body were not the soul, what were the soul?”

\-- Walt Whitman

Bodies were bodies to _Captain_ John Watson, and he had certainly seen a hell of a lot of naked men in his life. He’d lost his modesty along with the rest of his brothers-in-arms long before his tour of duty. It’s hard to be modest when you’re scrubbing half the Registan from the crack of your arse with nothing but a cloth and a canteen full of water. 

But John’s familiarity with nudity went beyond the simple and easy naked camaraderie of brothers-in-arms; the fact he was a doctor meant that he had seen and studied the human body in all its fleshy frailty. 

Being familiar with male nudity meant that _Doctor_ John Watson, in normal circumstances, would not be surprised by what lurked unseen under trousers and shirts. He’d seen it all, and, as doctors have learned to do, kept a straight face at all the interesting – and horrifying – things people kept hidden under their clothes. He’d seen skin of all sorts – the old, the young, the sun-damaged, the stretched, the dimpled, the scarred, the tattooed, the infected. He’d smelt death and putrefaction. He’d lanced boils, held distended intestines, been puked, pissed, and shit on, stitched ragged flaps of skin together, even treated a truly horrifying case of genital herpes all with a straight face and doctorly precision.

Right, then. The human body: weigh it, test it, catalogue it, diagnose it, heal it, soothe it. 

But, as any good doctor would tell you, most talented physicians cannot completely separate the flesh from the soul. What would have made John an exceptional GP, had he chosen that path instead of military service, was the care in which he treated the resident of the body, the way he genuinely cared for his patients, his desire to make better what was ill or broken. His emotional connection to his patients actually gave him an advantage as a field surgeon, almost as if his love of humanity opened some gateway from his mind to his hands that allowed him to work more quickly, with more precision, with grace, if you will, under extraordinarily stressful conditions. He was confident and had every right to be. John Watson was a damn good soldier and damn good doctor. 

_____________________________________

So, most of the time, a body was a body. Except when it wasn’t. 

At university, when he carefully undressed his lovers, mapping soft skin with his fingertips, kissing dips and curves, exploring wet and secret places, he easily shrugged aside the student of science and let his heart (and cock) take over; clinical assessment tucked away for a while. He learned the female body quickly and completely, and while he wasn’t exactly promiscuous, he had the pleasure of discovering he enjoyed many types of women’s bodies. (His sister once told him once when he was home for a holiday that he didn’t care what type of car he drove, as long as he was driving. It was a poor analogy, but John supposed it was true). 

During acts of love, flesh was beautiful, all types, sizes, and colours. Combine his love of the flesh with practised and knowing hands, and John Watson made one heck of a lover. Quite simply, he made women feel beautiful in their own skin, for, under John’s attentions, it _was_ beautiful: cellulite, stretch marks, blemishes, hair, and all. The _Lover_ John Watson could care less.

His romanticism sometimes earned him some good-natured jibes from his fellow soldiers, and even now, when he rarely met up with his old army mates, John was regaled with half-true stories of his sexual prowess. (Watson, you short arse bastard, how the hell do you do it? It’s the doctor thing, isn’t it. It’s got to be). And he’d smirk, raise his bottle, and drink to the bodies he’d healed with his hands and pleased with his tongue.

Indeed, John Watson knew the human body, both male and female forms of it, intimately, which is why, when he met Sherlock-it’s-all-transport-Holmes, he didn’t buy it. For someone who claimed not to care about his body, Sherlock spent far too much time on his appearance (three types of hair products?), and when he did eat, he indulged. He never wore vests under those tailored silk shirts, and even his casualwear was designer. John wondered if the bespoke suits were Sherlock’s way of keeping himself clean, to remind himself to look the part. Whatever his flatmate’s motivation was behind the tailored clothes, Sherlock remained a study in contradictions.

Sometimes, John imagines what Sherlock would have looked like strung out, lost in a drug-induced oblivion. It isn’t pretty. John’s seen addicts, watched drugs destroy a body: sacrilege. If Sherlock’s brain was his god, John, as his one and only friend, refused to let him destroy the temple.

His body somehow got what it needed to sustain that great and obnoxious brain of his, and he refused to heed John’s suggestions about how that great lump of grey matter may actually function better if he took better care of it. The great detective seemed to simply ignore the needs of his body, and, much to John’s chagrin, seemed determined to thwart John from the needs of his own.

Arguments went something like this: 

_I need to sleep, Sherlock! It’s been…thirty-six hours!_

Nonsense.

_Some of us enjoy eating, you know. It’s pleasurable. Bacon tastes good!_

Hurry up, John.

_I would like it if you didn’t ruin every single one of my dates, you complete wanker!_

Dull. Can’t you see I need you here? Do be quiet and keep up.

It was after one such row relatively early in their friendship where John flat out asked Sherlock if he ever had any biological imperative to have sex whatsoever. 

“Really, Sherlock,” John had said, flopping defeatedly into his chair, “I mean don’t you ever want to just, you know…”

Sherlock arched an eyebrow at him from his place at the kitchen table. “Say what you mean, John. Have intercourse?”

“Yeah. Some of us find it enjoyable. Necessary, even.” 

“Surely I don’t need to know about your sexual proclivities.”

John sighed and rubbed a hand over his face. He’d had a long day and needed a shave. “You’re going to ruin every date I ever have, aren’t you.” It was a fact, he knew it. It was either move out or never get laid again. Sherlock would know everything, deduce exactly what he had been up to, which positions he used and all the intimate minutiae of sex John would rather keep to himself. “I don’t understand how the stupid rules you give yourself apply to me.”

Sherlock changed a slide on his microscope, not even bothering to look over. “The work is important. The work needs me, and I need you. Ergo, it is to everyone’s benefit that you are always available to me. The rules are not stupid, as you say.”

“And you think my having a girlfriend would interfere with my availability?”

“Most certainly.”

“You aren’t my life, Sherlock. You did just fine without me all those years.” John exhaled loudly. Sherlock had mentioned on several occasions that his finding a flatmate - and even a flat - was a nearly impossible task: he knew he was difficult to live with, much less be friends with. He may be a genius, but his interpersonal skills were total shit. If Sherlock had a fear at all, John figured it was being on his own again, searching for another flat and a poor sod to put up with his antics. The truth was that Sherlock _wasn’t_ fine without him; he was alone and addicted and miserable. John didn’t want to move out. He just really wanted to, well, have an orgasm with another person. 

“Look, I’m not going anywhere. I just would really like to have sex once and a while. Skin-to-skin contact. Without you mucking it all up. Never mind. Forget I asked.” John stood and cracked his back. “I’m going to bed.” He’d nearly reached the stairs when he heard Sherlock say something.

“Why is it so important?” He didn’t look away from the microscope, which was lighting up his eyes (pale, prone to early cataracts, John thought, inability to make eye contact, emotional discomfort). “Sex. Nudity. Bodies touching.” He paused. “You’re the doctor. Biology?”

John waited, his aggravation dissipating. “No, Sherlock. It’s about pleasure. So don’t even tell me you don’t know just how many nerve endings are in fingertips or lips. Because you do. It’s about self-gratification, about feeling that you’re worth something. You should, by all accounts, enjoy it, you, who has to be the centre of attention, upstaging a goddamn corpse. It’s more than feeling good, though, it’s about wanting and being wanted. Sometimes, it’s even about love!” he finished, voice dripping sarcasm, before instantly regretting it. He sighed, feeling at once great pity for his closest friend. “Look, it’s fine. Just...it’s fine.”

Sherlock turned from the microscope, eyes flinty. “I’ve had lovers.”

Something turned in John’s belly at Sherlock’s pronunciation of the word. He was fairly certain Sherlock hadn’t had “lovers.” Wrong term. Sexual partners, maybe. If that man had had lovers, in the way John defines the term, then John has seriously missed something. 

“Right,” he said, anger rising again. “Must have been pretty memorable if they satiated your libido for the rest of your life, ‘cause I’m fairly certain ‘had’ is the correct form of the verb.” Sherlock gave him a strange look, a mixture of disdain, loathing, and hurt, before turning his attention back to whatever he was studying. Conversation over. “I’m going to bed, yeah? Try not to stay up all night.”

John plodded up the stairs. His bed was especially cold.

_____________________________________

“I don’t usually like to be touched,” said Sherlock one day after John had casually touched his shoulder. Sherlock was sitting at his computer, back ramrod straight, reading an online chemistry journal. John had put his hand on Sherlock’s shoulder to reach past him and grab his phone, which Sherlock had purloined – again. 

“Oh. Right. Sorry,” he apologized. John was touchy by nature; he hadn’t even realized he’d done it. That would explain a lot. He’d seen Sherlock eschew handshakes, and there were few people, if any, whom John thought would actually _want_ to touch Sherlock. 

“But I didn’t mind.” Sherlock turned from the screen and looked at John, as if he were trying to figure something out about his own body. Perhaps he just had.

“OK.” Sherlock was certainly okay with touching someone else, thought John, for all the times he’d been physically moved by him - _you were in the way_ \- or helped up - _take my hand_. “OK,” John said again, decisively. 

Sherlock offered no more.

_____________________________________

 

The toe bone is connected to the foot bone, the foot bone is connected to the leg bone, the leg bone is connected to the hip bone...

And the heart is connected to the head and the cock in a way that defies all logic.

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________

 

John had loved Sherlock, truly loved him, from very early on, in the way that John tends to love: steadily and true. John loved Sherlock in the way he’d love a brother, a fellow soldier, a best mate. Sherlock had filled a very large void in John’s life, had given him so much, made life worth living again. And John’s heart loved him for it.

Somewhere along the line, though, John’s body decided to board the train to Crazy Town and the glowing embers of his platonic love for the detective turned into a fairly sizeable fire. It wasn’t some raging inferno - not yet - and it happened so subtly that John couldn’t pinpoint when became sexually attracted to Sherlock. He’d always known the man was good looking, and his confidence and fastidious personal grooming gave him a mysterious allure, but what he was experiencing was beyond simple appreciation of an attractive body.

John suffered through a relatively short week-long sexual identity crisis. He had seen so many naked men; Sherlock’s flesh, however, held secrets John found himself longing to uncover: taste, scent, texture. Sometimes he felt like a teenager all over again, body singing with the desire to rut and come. Sherlock’s body was definitely male - but it was _Sherlock_ in there, and John’s heart connected with that enigmatic soul which somehow made its packaging incredibly scintillating. The mind inside that body was brilliant, but the body itself wasn’t half bad. Okay, it was gorgeous. Tall, angular, lithe, pale - everything that John’s wasn’t. 

Life at 221B Baker Street continued on much as normal, except that John had abandoned his pursuits of lovers and catalogued the classic hormonal urges associated with falling in love. He let himself bask in Sherlock’s intellect and waited for those moments when those unusual eyes would twinkle with mischievous glee or fond respect. John studied Sherlock’s hands and lips and the column of his throat and said nothing. He was fairly certain that if Sherlock wanted a sexual partner it would be a male one, but he never seemed attracted to anyone. John didn’t even know if the man had a wank now and then. If he did, what would he think of, if anything? As far as John could tell, Sherlock had subliminated his libido into the Work in order to avoid the whole useless, distracting, and unnecessary mess of sexual intercourse. 

There were moments, though, that John was sure that if he had just _done something_ , the two of them would have fallen into bed together, especially in the post-case adrenaline rush, but he couldn’t do it – too much to lose, he thought, and so he ignored his body, took his body’s reaction to Sherlock’s and relegated it to masturbatory fantasies. 

Eventually, the yearning subsided.

And Sherlock’s body remained off limits behind silk and wool. 

_____________________________________

John and Sherlock became something more than friends but less than lovers. Sometimes John wondered whether several years of his life had been deleted - the ones in which he and Sherlock had enjoyed crazy, passionate, endorphin-fueled sex - and what remained was the familiar comfort, bickering, and companionship of those long married. 

John gave up trying to define it. 

_____________________________________

Sherlock became famous. John became slightly less famous. Most of London thought they were shagging, which no longer annoyed John except in its sense of irony; they had seen each other partially naked (although not at the same time and certainly not under romantic pretences), had come close to kissing a dozen times, fallen asleep on the couch together, nursed each other through pains and sickness, had playful bouts of wrestling and spent one very cold night huddled in some shrubbery under Sherlock’s magnificent coat - but that was it. 

John managed to have a lover or two, ones Sherlock didn’t deem unacceptable, and life continued.

They were two bodies, sharing space, living together, behaving badly together, learning from one another. A strange but very strong friendship.

But bodies can be traitorous. Even Sherlock Holmes had to know that.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which John is surprised, Sherlock discovers that he needs more data, and Molly reveals a secret. The plot begins properly.

 

_Examine these limbs, red, black, or white, they are cunning in tendon and nerve,_ _They shall be stript that you may see them._

-Walt Whitman

Chapter 2

“That poor girl’s besotted with you. Do you have to torment her?”

“I do _not_ torment her,” Sherlock said, the quirk of his lips betraying his serious tone. 

“Yeah, you do.”

“Molly is helpful and... kind.”

“She routinely breaks hospital policy for you just because you give her that look when you want something.”

“What look is that?”

“This one.” John tried his best to emulate Sherlock’s trademark smoulder, used on women as a means to an end, but, sadly, never directed at him. John imagined that if he ever did get that look for real, he just may melt into a puddle of want on the floor.

Sherlock actually laughed, a huff of breath that made John smile. “That’s quite good.” 

“So,” said John as Sherlock ushered him in a staff entrance with a key card he procured from god-knows-where. He was specifically asked to sign in at the front desk. Sometimes there was even a fan or two milling about, asking for autographs that Sherlock pretended to be put out to sign but always did. “A case, then?”

“No. Bored. I’m being proactive, John. Be proud.” 

John had been encouraging Sherlock to _do something productive_ between cases, a task much easier said than done. Sherlock’s black moods were miserable and sometimes scary, and, as a doctor and good friend, John tried (to an extent) to help Sherlock through the crippling ennui. Such an endeavour was not for the faint-hearted, and as often or not John just gave up, said “Fuck it”, and angrily stalked off to the pub while Sherlock destroyed the flat. As time passed, though, Sherlock matured; Mycroft seemed much less concerned and “danger nights” became far and few between. 

Sherlock would complain obnoxiously about being dragged from the flat (you _are_ taking a shower and getting dressed, John would insist, sometimes bodily dragging Sherlock off the couch and pushing him into the bathroom) but once he was out he was fairly decent company, as far as a mercurial genius man-child could be. He enjoyed walks around the city and trips to shops where he could find old books. There was a tobacco shop that, if Sherlock had behaved particularly well, John would let him visit and _inhale_ for a while. Sometimes they talked for hours; other times, they just sat together in Regent’s Park, doing nothing in particular except existing side-by-side. 

John had managed to talk the administrator of Barts’ research wing into letting Sherlock have uninterrupted access to a lab once a week on condition that he signed in and out, didn’t blow anything up, and made a list of the supplies he used so they could be restocked. He was not, however, allowed unsupervised time in the mortuary, at which he sulked about for a week before John finally lost his patience and yelled at him to be grateful that they even let him touch the electron microscope.

“Does she even know you’re coming?”

“Of course not,” replied Sherlock, holding open the door to the hall that would lead to the pathology departmentt. “Ruins the surprise.”

John put his hand on the door before Sherlock had a chance to burst inside. “Just how bored are you?” he asked, Watson Damage Control instincts kicking in.

Sherlock looked down at him. He looked like he did while on a case, a bit manic, slightly sinister. “I bet I can make her drop something,” he said in response, lifting his eyebrows, before pushing past John and into the cool sterility of the mortuary.

“You’re pure evil,” John muttered behind him.

Molly was preparing to perform an autopsy. She looked up at the pair from her her paper mask, eyes lighting up when she saw Sherlock, who wasted no time shucking his coat, rolling up his shirtsleeves and finding gloves. (John gave him a case of nitrile surgical gloves as a Christmas gift once - Sherlock needed the largest size available and took an unnatural delight in snapping them on and then finding something to do that would require their use.) 

“Hi,” Molly beamed, clutching her clipboard to her chest. “You’re, um, supposed to sign in,” she spluttered. “Did you sign in? They wanted me to tell you to sign in if you hadn’t.”

“I’m afraid I bypassed that completely today,” Sherlock replied, “but you’re not going to tell, are you? Mundane. Dull. Now, dear Molly, tell me whom we have here.”

John heard Molly begin telling Sherlock the details of the deceased, whom, from where John was standing, looked fairly young and in good health. 

“Well,” said John, who didn’t particularly consider autopsies as recreational as the other two people in the room, “I’m going to go sign him in and get coffee. Be back in a while.” He was nearly out before he heard Sherlock proclaim, “Fascinating!” and go to get his magnifying glass. “John, you’ve got to see this.”

“Seen loads of bodies, Sherlock. Think I can afford to miss one.”

“John. _Come here_ ” 

Well, it was better than watching telly, he supposed. “Fine, Sherlock,” he began as he approached the man on the table. John’s first thoughts were something along the lines of “young, good looking, no visible signs of trauma, no blood, all limbs intact…” before switching over to the thought that voiced itself completely unbidden: “He’s _naked!”_ How unprofessional, he thought, as soon as the words passed his lips.

“Obviously, John. He’s in the mortuary,” said Sherlock, already roving over the body with the magnifier.

“Really naked,” supplied Molly. “They found him his morning. Naked. I guess he didn’t show up for work. He just...died.”

John had to remember to close his mouth. This poor sod was naked in the true sense of the word – all his body hair had been completely stripped, and from the looks of his face, which had been left alone, he was once a fairly hairy fellow. “Please don’t tell me he died from hair removal.”

“I highly doubt someone would expire simply from depilation, John,” said Sherlock dryly. “Tell me what you see.”

John collected his thoughts, stepped into physician mode, put own a pair of gloves, and began to examine the body in earnest. “Male, twenty-five to thirty, physically fit, more so on the upper body than the lower…maybe an athlete…a gymnast? Not a body builder, though. Calluses on the palms – wait. No, never mind.” He paused, looking at the very bare skin of the victim’s chest before lifting an arm and examining the naked armpit, looking for clues. Nothing obvious. 

“Method of hair removal?”

“Not shaving. Well, wait. Maybe his chest was shaved. The armpits weren’t. Neither were his legs. Or his pubic area. A professional job, surely.”

“Obviously. Turn him over.” Sherlock stayed back, lavender rubber-clad fingers steepled under his nose as John and Molly turned the corpse face-down. “Examine his back.”

John took his time evaluating the rest of the man’s back and the back of his arms. “Well, there are tiny abrasions here - and here...” he pointed to several small areas of irritation down the middle of the man’s back, “but besides that, I don’t see anything out of the ordinary. Except the lack of hair, that is.”

“Everywhere.” Molly’s small voice drew both men up from their study. “He’s hairless everywhere,” she emphasised, pursed her lips together, raised her eyebrows, and nodded at the poor man’s backside. Sherlock, unfazed, stepped forward and proceeded to spread the man’s cheeks. Completely. Bare. John’s eyebrows nearly touched his hairline.

“Indeed,” said Sherlock, before continuing down to study the corpse’s legs.

In all of John’s medical adventures dealing with men’s backsides, he had never seen one completely and utterly hairless. A few of his female lovers had nearly stripped themselves bare, but here, at the body’s most secretive and sensitive of places, there was always some trace of hair. Some bodies had it in abundance, where others just had a dusting – this man had none. Jesus. That must have hurt.

Molly turned an alarming shade of red as Sherlock pocketed his glass and began to sniff the body. Really sniff. Great snuffling inhalations about two centimeters from the victim’s bare skin, starting by his feet and slowly making his way up the man’s thighs. “Really, Sherlock,” said John, “is that completely - do NOT taste it, you idiot!”

“I’m trying to determine the method of hair removal, John. A recent waxing would leave traces on his skin, so it’s not that, maybe some kind of chemical depilatory... ” -- he paused to sniff dramatically – “Skin smells very faintly of lemon.”

“What? You’re saying all of this” - he waved his arm over the body - “was...how recent? Wouldn’t he have showered or something since then? Lemon?” He was vaguely aware that he was spluttering. Watching your flatmate nearly lick a corpse will do that to a man.

“Very recent. Yesterday, maybe, the day before that. Why would he remove his hair, John?”

“Beats me. Maybe for sports, a swimmer, perhaps, or bodybuilder, but that doesn’t explain the complete removal of his pubic hair – or that of his unfortunate anus.”

“Perhaps he was a considerate lover.”

A memory rose like a bubble in John’s mind - _I’ve had lovers_ \- before popping. “Gay?”

Sherlock shot him a look and a frown. “One does not have to be homosexual to be a considerate lover.”

“I never realised removing one’s hair was a pre-requisite for being considerate.”

“You should know, what with your superior knowledge of all things intimate and sexual.”

“Oh yes, I’m just a regular Doctor Don Juan-son.”

“That I don’t doubt.”

John met Sherlock’s eyes in one of _those moments_ they sometimes shared, the ones where nothing was said where something wanted to be said. John was sure either both of them would burst out giggling, as they sometimes did in these situations, or whether Sherlock would dismiss himself and flee the scene. 

Somewhere to his left, Molly let out a small squeak. 

“So,” said John, breaking the awkward moment, “he could remove his body hair for aesthetic purposes. Or sexual purposes. That doesn’t explain why he’s dead.”

For a few long moments Sherlock stayed still, eyes flickering over the body, mind engaged. John looked away from the man’s naked arse, which was, indeed a very nice-looking arse as far as bodies went, and Molly gaped at Sherlock in something between horror and infatuation. 

“The question is, was the victim so thoroughly divested of his hair before or after his death?”

“There’s no growth at all,” remarked John, brain back online. “And if it was within the past twenty-four hours, I’d expect some degree of irritation, even if his denuding was routine. Oh God. Do you think it was done post-mortem?”

Sherlock shrugged and his face twitchd, eyes drifting shut - he’d gone to the Mind Palace. Nothing to do but wait - and watch. Apparently whatever Sherlock had stored in there about hair removal was not much; he returned to himself after a moment and frowned. 

“Need more data,” the detective eventually announced, abruptly swirling around and abandoning his introspection. “Molly,” he began as he collected his belongings, “where do you get your, oh wait, of course you don’t. Not with your stagnant social life, frankly awful taste in men, and obsession with cats. Probably not appropriate to ask anyway, never mind. John, give me your phone. I have to make an appointment.”

“Sherlock? Are we going somewhere?”

Sherlock collected his things and wrapped his scarf around his neck before turning his attention to John’s phone. His eyebrows came together as he scanned for something before he nodded decisively. 

“We just got here! Where are you going?”

“Out!” said the great detective. He looked Molly right in the eyes before declaring in his lowest, most deadly register, “I’ve got the sudden urge to _manscape_." He smiled devilishly before whirling out of the morgue dramatically with a swirl of coattails. 

He left so quickly he didn’t even hear Molly’s clipboard hit the floor.

John blinked, looked at Molly, who was still blushing furiously, and shrugged his shoulders. “Sorry,” he muttered. “He’s a right prat.”

“He’s wrong. I do, you know.”

“What’s that?”

“Wax. My, um...” 

“Molly, I really don’t want to know.” They both blinked for a moment before John gathered his wits. “You know,” he said, “for all I can tell, this poor bloke died of a heart attack.”

“Right.” She took a deep breath, retrieved her clipboard, and composed herself. “I’ll let you know. Ring you later.”

Sherlock was waiting for him by the lift. 

“ _Manscaping_ , Sherlock? What the fuck was that about?”

“Did she...” he began.

“Yes,” said John, laughing in spite of himself. “Yes, she did.”


	3. Chapter 3

_I have perceiv’d that to be with those I like is enough,_  
To stop in company with the rest at evening is enough,  
To be surrounded by beautiful, curious, breathing, laughing flesh is enough,  
To pass among them or touch any one, or rest my arm ever so lightly round his or her neck for a moment, what is this then?  
I do not ask any more delight, I swim in it as in a sea.  
There is something in staying close to men and women and looking on them, and in the contact and odor of them, that pleases the soul well,  
All things please the soul, but these please the soul well. 

-Walt Whitman

______________________________________________________________________

Sherlock gave the cabbie an address and hunkered down with his phone, apparently researching. John was both amused and concerned. Last time Sherlock immersed himself into a new line of study it had been something to do with fish and rendered the flat so uninhabitable that John had to call to get it professionally cleaned and Mrs. Hudson was so Not Amused that she didn’t offer tea and biscuits for nearly a fortnight.

“Where, exactly, are we going?” he ventured. 

“Quick, John, unbutton your shirt,” said Sherlock, tucking his phone back into the pocket of his coat.

John shot a look at the cabbie, who had to have heard that. “Not good, Sherlock,” he warned.

Sherlock rolled his eyes a bit. “Just do it.”

“No. If this is your way of coming on to me, it’s all wrong.” He’d meant it as a joke, but it came out flat and awkward. “Look, I know exactly what you’re doing. You are _not_ going to use me as some experiment in hair removal. Nope.

Sighing, Sherlock huffed against the side of the cab. “I don’t have much on my chest,” he pouted.

“And neither do I.”

“I wouldn’t know. Your modesty is impeccable.”

“Yeah, you would. Fairly sure you’ve deduced everything there is to deduce about me.”

Sherlock scowled. “No,” he said simply after a while. “I haven’t.”

“Well, you should at least deduce that I am _not_ going to be waxed in the name of science.”

They rode in silence for a block before traffic slowed to a crawl. 

“So why do you think he’s hairless?” John asked after Sherlock’s pout dissolved. 

“Multiple reasons, likely. Fairly sure he’s an exotic dancer of some type, but not as a day job; hands callused from hard work, building trade likely, given the weathering of his face and backs of his hands but not his chest. There were tiny contusions on several places on his back and on the backs of his legs, likely from friction, cloth being removed by force; contusions caused by velcro fasteners as it was ripped in apart during a performance. The removal of his chest and back hair would be for aesthetics. Yet a stripper would have no reason to completely remove his pubic hair, or the hair under his arms, for that matter. Unless, of course he wanted to.”

“What about his perineum?”

“As I said, considerate lover. Either that, or he did it for comfort. I’m assuming he would wear a g-string while performing.”

There are some words Sherlock Holmes simply should not say. “G-string” was one of them. John’s brain went completely offline and the the words _considerate lover_ echoed through in his head. All the fantasies about Sherlock’s body came flooding back. What would Sherlock’s body look like? John longed to touch it, trail his fingers through whatever hair did reside on Sherlock’s chest, under his arms, across his belly... between his legs. 

Shit. Oh fucking shit.

“How much do you know about hair removal, John?”

John blinked and remembered to breathe. “I shave every morning.”

“Yes, and once in the evening if you’re going out.”

He smiled, trying to be casual. “Well, yes. Considerate lover, right?” 

Sherlock gave him a blank look.

“Stubble burn. I’m told it’s not all that comfortable. Some girls like it, though,” he said absently. 

“I wouldn’t know.”

“Not your area, right.”

“How long does it take you to grow a beard?”

“A full one? Oh, a good week for it to look respectable.” John turned from where he was staring out the window. Traffic hadn’t moved. “Can you even grow a beard?”

“I can grow a _luscious_ beard, John,” he replied, frowning. “Just because I don’t have five o’clock shadow by one in the afternoon does not make me incapable of growing facial hair.”

John chuckled at the thought of Sherlock fully bearded. “No you can’t.”

“I shall have to do it, then.”

“No! Just...don’t. That would be...” John trailed off, surprised at his own reaction. “All wrong,” he settled for at last. “It would make you less recognisable, though.”

They sat in silence for a while before Sherlock said, “I didn’t know you cared that much about my appearance.” A smile played across his mouth. 

“You certainly care about it,” said John taking the moment to determine the state of his own stubble. He hadn’t shaved that morning - no reason to - and it was starting to itch a bit. “I know exactly how long you spend on your hair. Enjoy it while you’ve got it. Although it shows no signs of falling out.”

“My father had a full head of hair at the end of his life. Same with my mother’s father. Turned silver, of course, but remained an unruly mop long into their eighties.”

“You don’t have an unruly mop. A mop, yes, but you’re quite good at ruling it.”

“You like my hair.”

John frowned and shrugged. “It’s good hair.” One day he would really like to run his fingers through it. Bury his face in it and smell it. 

Sherlock looked pleased and amused, as if he had revealed another clue to a mystery. John didn’t like it. It always made him wonder whether Sherlock really could read his mind. The detective always said he could deduce John’s thoughts simply from his facial expressions - he’d catalogued them all, as far as John knew, on little mental index cards tucked somewhere away in his Mind Palace - but often the things Sherlock knew about John made John think that perhaps Sherlock could see more, see deeper, than surface tells, lines of the face, twitches of the lips. Of course he could. They were...friends, after all. Flatmates. The other unidentifiable thing of which they did not speak. 

The cab started moving again. “So, how much do I know about hair removal?” said John, continuing the original conversation. He put aside those nagging feelings and considered what he did know. “It’s biologically fascinating, actually. Adult humans grow body hair to distinguish themselves from children. It’s a mark of sexual maturity; hair under the arms and on the groin holds in not only heat, but scent, pheromones, sex attractants. And then people shave it off to be more sexy. A bit counterintuitive.”

“Do you find it attractive?”

“What? Shaving? I’ve got to say I fully appreciate bare legs and armpits. Perhaps a little trimming of the bush is appropriate.”

“Why?”

“Well, it’s aesthetically pleasing. If a woman’s going to show you her knickers, best not concentrate on what’s under them, not what’s escaping out the sides. I guess I really don’t have much of a preference when it comes to pubes, Sherlock. I can’t believe I’m having this conversation with you in a cab at four o’clock on a Thursday afternoon.”

“What about men?”

“What about them?” Something told John he was heading into dangerous territory. Surely Sherlock wouldn’t go _there_ , not now, not here.

“Hair, John. Armpits. Legs. Groin. Does that bother you?”

Jesus. Was Sherlock just mining for data? John didn’t think so. “I haven’t given it much thought,” he answered honestly. “Not really _my_ area.” 

“Hm,” was all Sherlock said in response. 

They rode the next few blocks in silence, John trying very hard not to think about whether or not body hair - a very male secondary sex characteristic - would have any impact about his attraction to Sherlock. He’d imagined his flatmate naked, sure, but the imagination has a way of making everything hazy and perfect-looking, like film does. No one was perfect under his clothes; John knew that for a fact. What would happen if they did cross that line, if one day those near-kisses, those infrequent but warm, friendly touches, an arm around a shoulder, the thumb spending more than a fleeting moment across the nape of the neck, and they tumbled out of their clothing and into each other’s arms? Would John’s hitherto heterosexual body balk, his mind rebel, his libido take off screaming down the hallway at the sight of all that hair? 

The image of the corpse’s body came back to him. The lack of his body hair was off-putting and unnatural. So, no. His body would respond to Sherlock’s regardless of what was under those suits, the simple joy of touch and response would outweigh any qualms John might have. If Sherlock initiated the touch, if he kissed back, if he responded to touch with loud groans or soft whimpers or even with silence - John wouldn’t care. It would be delightful. He suddenly had a vision of his own hand trailing down Sherlock’s chest, over smooth pectorals...

Sherlock had said he had little hair on his chest, and from what John could gather from the time he’d seen the detective in his shirtsleeves, the short hair on his arms was fine and nearly a clear auburn. He’d never seen Sherlock’s bare legs. His miles of legs. His long, lean, muscled bare miles of legs, covered in soft, fine hair...

“John! Are you coming? We’re here.”

Snapped uncomfortably out of his thoughts, like fresh gum being pulled up from a pavement by a shoe, John sighed and told his not-so-soft cock to behave.

He paid the driverand prepared to follow his friend into...a hair and beauty salon?

John took one look at the place and knew this adventure would not end well.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Sherlock's face and John's wallet is abused.

Chapter 4

John had flatly refused to accompany Sherlock to the reception desk to do whatever it was he was planning on doing. He was acutely aware that he was standing in one of the trendiest salons in Soho and fairly terrified that the evening was going to end up with one of them smelling of mint and verbena. So he stood stoically by the door next to a wall of windows and glass shelving housing brightly colored toiletries. 

He could hear Sherlock no doubt saying something brilliant, slipping on someone else’s persona as easily as his coat. It was unnerving - the man could have made a career of acting. The problem was, whenever Sherlock actually got when he was after, he discarded the act immediately, and that was when the problems usually began. 

Who knows what he told the young woman at reception, but he was apparently ushered behind the black velvet curtain that partially concealed the salon proper from the waiting area. John could see black leather reclining chairs and lights reflected off of mirrors beyond. The whole place had a modern vibe, catering to London’s twentisomething mediafolk; bamboo flooring, exposed ceiling beams, simple yet posh decor. Several framed articles hung on the wall, proclaiming the salon’s accolades from women’s magazines. A flat screen television the size of a small sofa showed slides of supposedly stylish cuts and colors. Somewhere above him, satellite radio filtered through the sounds of blow dryers and women’s idle chatter. 

John smiled at a salesperson who approached and asked him if he needed help choosing shampoo. Some of the prices advertised were worth nearly a day’s worth of John’s salary at the surgery. He smiled politely and told the girl he was waiting for someone.

Standing in front of the wall of products, John was reminded at the lengths women took to groom themselves. Sure, he’d lived with women before, but it had been a long time; he’d forgotten. Harry had never been one to drop more than a fiver on anything for her short blonde hair. He’d lived with a girl named Anne for a time during med school; she had the most wonderful strawberry-scented stuff that always turned him on (he would forever remember how she’d shake her hair from a ponytail and the scent, warm and feminine, would make him weak in the knees and rock-hard other places. He masturbated with it in the shower for nearly six months after they split). 

Who knows how much Sherlock’s brand cost - John didn’t see it here, but knew it was salon-issued. John didn’t dare ever use it. Sherlock would know. He could probably determine how many mL were left by sight alone. 

This place had a whole wall devoted to hair products, enough nail polish to reconstruct a Michelangelo fresco on a wall of the Underground, and an entire arsenal of body creams and lotions that smelled like they should be eaten, not applied to the body. 

He tried to see beyond the curtain a bit more; Sherlock wasn’t in the salon area there. The place had three floors, however; he likely was somewhere else, having wormed his way into this strange wonderland of feminine smells and sounds. John continued trying to busy himself with products - it was only a matter of time before the pretty salesgirl would be back - when he found himself in front of a section entitled “massage”, written in pretty lavender script on expensive stationary set next to a little pile of smooth stones. Somehow the bottles, dark in color with fancy labels, reminded him of beer bottles. He wouldn’t mind a nice cold lager right there and then.

He picked one up, frowning, turning it over in his hands and read the ingredients: grapeseed, coconut, jojoba, and sweet almond oils. Intended to “penetrate deeply” and be “intensely moisturizing” while “providing a thoroughly enjoyable massage experience”. It was also completely organic and edible. Oh boy. It had been years since John had had a proper massage - and by proper, he meant one given by a girl, usually before sex. He had only had deep tissue massage in physiotherapy for his shoulder - and that wasn’t “enjoyable.” It fucking hurt. It might be nice to have someone else’s hands on that shoulder now, big hands, strong enough to ease the stiffness but soft enough to feel good.... An oil like this, he thought, would likely be very nice for wanking. Would beat the hell out of soap, mineral oil, or spit, at least. 

He was about to make a discreet attempt to smell it when a group of young women walked in, talking loudly and excitedly. A hen night, he guessed. Best not to be seen loitering with massage oil; back on the shelf it went. He caught the eye of one of the girls - a pretty brunette with flushed cheeks who gave him a dazzling smile. Maybe...nah.

John abandoned the wall of beauty products, sat down in a ridiculously comfortable black leather chair, plucked a brochure from a rack on the table, and began reading, half-listening to the girls’ conversation as they checked in with the receptionist. A hen night, yes. Manicures, pedicures, and facials and massages. Second floor spa. Champagne and chocolate. The brunette shot John another look; he smiled and nodded back, and then they, too, were swallowed up behind the curtain. 

Sighing, John returned to the brochure. Too much longer and he was going to text Sherlock and go find some dinner. He was trying to make sense of “vajazzling” when something that sounded like an angry flock of seagulls erupted from somewhere behind the velvet curtain and a rather befuddled-looking Sherlock came stumbling out, sporting the distinct redness of face that comes after being backhanded. 

John abandoned the brochure and crossed the reception area in a heartbeat.

“She hit me!” Sherlock said dejectedly, raising his hand to his cheek.

“Is he with you, then?” said the owner of the squawk. A pretty girl, under too many precisely applied cosmetics. “Out, the both of you! Perverts! I’ll call the cops!”

Sherlock stood there, stupidly, for once in his life unable to come up with something witty or clever. “Oh, go and sit down, Sherlock,” said John, preparing himself for damage control. 

__________________________________________________

The stylist was clearly put out. God only knows what Sherlock had said to her - or done back there. “I’m really sorry,” John began. “Did he tell you who he was?”

“He said he worked for _Cosmopolitan_. Clearly that’s a sack of shite. I don’t care who he was. Do you know what he wanted? Just get out.”

John did his best to give her a winsome smile. “Is there any way I can speak to your manager? I’m John Watson, and that git in the coat is...”

“You need to leave and take him with you, now!”

She took a deep breath as a woman who was clearly the manager came from behind the velvet curtain, eyebrows drawn up in concern.

“Can you please explain to me why three of our clients just reported a man asked to, and I quote, ‘observe the irritation of the labia majora post-epilation’?” 

“Jesus. Christ.” John scrubbed a hand over his face. “I’m horribly sorry about all of this. I’m John Watson. Look, how can I...”

“Wait - John Watson? The blogger? Oh! Oh God. Then that’s...” - she nodded in Sherlock’s direction. He was unscrewing every single bottle of shampoo on the wall of products and smelling them. He didn’t bother putting the caps back on. “ _That’s_ Sherlock Holmes? The detective?” 

The flush of the angry woman’s face faded a bit, and she laughed dryly. “I thought he was some kind of...sick voyeur. He told me he was writing an article for a contemporary women’s magazine about men’s opinions of women’s personal grooming. He said he had a few questions and wanted to do a write-up of the spa. Then - boom - he’s got his nose in everyone’s business! Then he told me about...” She blushed. “Never mind.”

“All he had to say was that he was Sherlock Holmes,” said the manager, who was now looking a bit fondly at Sherlock, who still sniffing away. “I know some of us wouldn’t mind...being deduced.”

John coughed. 

“Sorry,” she said, swallowing.

“He’s not interested, trust me,” said John, doing his best not to look uncomfortable. “He’s researching. For cases, you know. Uh, for forensic work. Very important.” _And he doesn’t like women that way,_ he thought. _And he’s mine. Hands off._

“Too bad,” said the manager, and gave him a knowing look. Ah yes, another one. _Sherlock Holmes and his “blogger”, indeed_. 

Thoughts. Stupid, stupid thoughts. John always hated when inklings of jealousy would bloom - ugly little weeds - simply because he knew that if he weren’t such a coward there would be no need for jealousy. They loved each other in their own weird, fucked-up way. 

John knew, though, sadly, that it would never be enough. Sex and love just went together for him, they _had_ to, and as for Sherlock? John feared rejection too much to just close that distance. He was fairly sure, though, that one day, sooner rather than later, something would have to give. Physicality was so _hard_ for Sherlock, but it came as naturally to John as breathing. His body would betray him, override his head and heart and then there would either be mind-blowing sex or Sherlock would retreat deep into his head and the man John had grown to love would be lost to him forever. 

Just then, a woman who had apparently been one of Sherlock’s victims came forth, spots of color still on her cheeks. “I had expected better from such an establishment,” she puffed. “I won’t be back again.” She turned on her heel and made for the door when she saw Sherlock. He was rubbing something, it looked like, between his fingers, testing its viscosity, most like. John knew the word that was going to come out of her mouth before she said it, like the “f” was being formed in slow motion. 

“Freak! You’re a sick freak!” she shouted at him before strutting out the door.

“Well, there goes that appointment,” said the manager. “And she was here for the the full monty. Damn.”

John looked to where Sherlock was frowning away at whatever it is he got all over his hands. “How much did you lose?” he asked the manager.

“Nearly £175.”

John nodded, sighed, and reached for his credit card.

________________________________________________________________________

 

“I’ll spare you the humiliation of putting this in the blog,” said John.

Sherlock huffed, leaning his head on the window of the cab. “She _hit_ me,” he said again. 

“Well, yeah, Sherlock. You can’t simply waltz in some place and ask to observe genital waxing, Sherlock. What did you think they’d do? Just let you sit there, magnifying glass three inches from some girl’s intimate bits and take notes? That was really poorly-thought-out.”

“Point taken, John.”

“And what’s up with choosing _that_ place? Of all the places you could have picked, you had to pick somewhere high-profile that catered specifically to women, for God’s sake...”

“I said, point taken, John.”

“...I mean, haven’t you studied...hair and all that...before? How on earth could you have missed that in your obsession with all things dead and dying? You just saw a hairless corpse and that big brain of yours just went” - John pitched his voice lower and did his best Sherlock impression- “Oh, perhaps I don’t know everything there is to know about genital grooming practices because I really don’t like to look at them, not my area and all, but maybe they really are fascinating if people go to such lengths to...”

“Shut up.”

“...make them attractive for other people...”

“Shut up.”

“...but I wouldn’t know because I’m the great Sherlock Holmes and my body is merely transport for my glorious brain...”

“ _Enough!_ ” Sherlock roared.

John shut his mouth with a click.

“I don’t understand why you’re upset, anyway,” said Sherlock after a tense moment.

“No, you never do.” They rode the last few streets in silence. “Look,” said John as they neared their favorite Thai place, “there’s something called the Internet, Sherlock. Use it next time you want to see living people with their clothes off.”

“Oh, that’s not half as much fun.”

“Or as embarrassing or expensive.”

“You should have heard them just talking away in there. Apparently a woman’s salon is much like therapy. Slap on a plastic cape, add water, lather, and divulge every secret you have. It’s like confession. With ammonia and scissors. Could be extremely helpful on cases. Would save everyone a lot of time if the killer just admits it.”

John sighed. “I doubt a murderer would sit down, discuss the weather, her children, and the husband she did in.”

“Either way, there is so much to _hear_. Observe. It’s fascinating. I should have chosen a unisex place, however. There’s one a few blocks from Baker Street; maybe I could work something out.”

“You need a case. Badly.”

“No, John. I need hair.” He waved his arms around in a flourish. “I’m going to devote a page of my blog to it. I need to begin gathering samples immediately. Human only, of course,” he added, as if that would make John feel any better about the strangeness of the whole thing. 

“No! No hair. In fact, I don’t want to hear about hair for the rest of the night. And you are not allowed out of the flat tomorrow,” John said, the last of his anger fading away, being replaced with the exasperating fondness he had for this brilliant madman. Manic Sherlock was better than depressive Sherlock, he reminded himself. Sooner or later he would be neck-deep in some grisly puzzle and it would be back to insults, being ignored, nicotine patches, and pacing around the flat.

“I’m going to be at the surgery until five, and then we’ll find you a nice, juicy case, all right? We’ll go and harass Lestrade and you can contaminate some of Anderson’s samples or something. But today, Sherlock, today was just weird. No more.”

“Don’t worry. I wasn’t planning on going out.”

“Good. Wait, what? What exactly do you plan on doing?”

“Today was incredibly enlightening, John, not _weird_. I think I shall conduct research tomorrow. On the Internet,” he added in a voice he reserved for placating, eyeing John as if to ward off more protests. “And maybe... chemistry. And I shall go out if the whim strikes. I resent being treated like a child. You are not my keeper.”

“I’ve been your keeper for the better part of two years, Sherlock. Nothing new. Now,” he said, “I’m going to enjoy my dinner. You’re going to attempt to behave like a normal human being. And you’re paying. Don’t forget your bag. I’m _not_ carrying it for you.”

Sherlock glared at John for a moment before shouldering a very large, heavy carrier containing all manner of bottles - £ 175 worth, to be exact. 

Unbeknownst to John, at the bottom of the bag, carefully wrapped in tissue paper, was a small brown bottle full of “completely organic and edible oil”, intended to “penetrate deeply” and be “intensely moisturising” while “providing a thoroughly enjoyable massage experience”.

Oh boy.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Sherlock makes an error, gives a gift, and damages the transport.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Infinite thanks to BettySwallocks for the encouragement, plot-pushing, and Britpicking. I owe her.

Chapter 5

The next three days were kind of like an approaching storm; the atmosphere in 221b Baker Street changed, thickened almost, and John could tell that _something_ was on the verge of happening. It was one of those things he just knew, the way he could tell that something was just the slightest bit off, the way he had warned his men back in Afghanistan, _sleep lightly, boys, it’s going to be a long night._ Sherlock was up to something, and for once, his study seemed to have turned to John. 

The day after the face-slapping incident, John returned home an hour later than he’d hoped from the surgery to find Sherlock glued to his microscope. He was still in his pyjamas and dressing gown, and it looked like he really hadn’t gone out, although he was clean-shaven and his hair tamed to its “I’m going out” perfection.

“Start on your samples?” John asked, half in jest as he loosened his tie and flopped down into his chair. It had been a fairly busy day, what with one nurse calling in sick and another having been called away to care for her son who had fallen and broken his wrist. Not one to ever balk under pressure - in fact, it usually forced him to perform better - John handled the rest of the afternoon with aplomb, but he was tired. 

“Yes,” replied Sherlock. John was surprised he answered at all; usually once he was occupied behind the microscope, back ramrod straight and eyes bright, he didn’t speak except to demand his phone or something else that was usually within his reach. 

“But you didn’t leave the flat?” Sherlock hadn’t, John was sure. A line of worry appeared between John’s brows. 

“Excellent observation.”

Sighing, John stood, cracked his back, and went into the kitchen under the pretense of making tea. He turned the kettle on, settled a teabag in the bottom of his mug, and sat on the worktop. “May I ask what you’re looking at?”

There were several rows of slides set up to the right of the scope. They were labelled, but from his perch John couldn’t read them. 

“Hair, John,” Sherlock replied, as if it were obvious.

John frowned and nodded. The kettle made little noises as it heated, but otherwise the flat was still and quiet. Outside, a car hooted its horn. “May I ask whose?” he said at last, with a horrible suspicion he already knew the answer.

“Mine,” said Sherlock. John hopped down and poured the water. “And yours.”

“Mine?”

“Yours.”

“Sherlock, where did you...” For one scary moment John wondered if Sherlock had surreptitiously gathered his hair while he was sleeping. 

“Telogen, John. There are between 100,000 and 350,000 hair follicles on the human scalp alone. A person loses between 50 to 100 hairs a day as certain follicles go into their resting cycle. You know that already. We live together and neither of us is particularly fond of hoovering, so collecting your body hair was insipidly easy.”

“You. Collected my... body hair? What the hell, Sherlock? That’s just...disgusting.”

“It’s just hair.”

“Please tell me you didn’t crawl around the flat on your hands and knees.”

“No.” Sherlock actually pushed himself away from his microscope. John swore he was smiling in that straight-faced way of his. “I went down, got Mrs. Hudson’s hoover, cleaned the flat, and then methodically went through the dust canister. It was relatively easy to separate hair from the rest of the mess - you have been eating toast in excess lately, I might add, from the number of crumbs - and from there, I just sorted them into their types: scalp, androgenic, and vellus, although the latter were much more difficult to find amid all the dust, and then I just had to figure out which ones were yours and mine, which I thought would be easy to determine due to colour and texture but found it to be more difficult than I imagined...”

“Stop. Just...stop, Sherlock.” John scrubbed a hand over his face. 

“Not good?”

“No. Not good. Look, I really have learned to live with feet in the refrigerator but...personal space, yeah? I know you have very little concept of privacy..” - Sherlock scoffed at that - “...but leave my body out of it. Everything in this flat is fair game - most of it’s yours, anyway - but this,” he gestured at his body, “and everything that comes out and off it is mine. Mine, Sherlock. Not yours,” he added, just to be clear.

“You don’t want me looking at your hair.”

John nodded. Sometimes Sherlock was remarkably daft. “Hair or otherwise. And if you analyse my toothbrush, there will be consequences.”

Sherlock’s eyes flitted to the slides on the table and back to John. He actually looked mildly guilty.. “So, collecting your epithelial cells is out?”

John swore his eyelid was about to twitch. “I’m taking a shower,” he announced, “and then I’m eating some dinner, watching some telly, and going to bed.” He turned on his heel and headed to the loo, realizing he’d left his tea untouched on the counter. 

He was midway through relieving himself when he realized that Sherlock had arranged all of the new products from yesterday’s ill-fated visit to the salon in descending order by height on the shelf that hung above the toilet. The last bottle was the brown one, and it didn’t take a genius to see that it had been opened, the paper seal broken with a thumbnail.

John flushed the toilet and stared at the bottle before turning the shower on. Like as not Sherlock was intently listening to his movements; nothing was sacred. With the shower running, Sherlock was less likely to hear John take the bottle and examine it; it didn’t look like any had been used, but the seal had indeed been broken. He unscrewed the cap and tentatively sniffed - it really was a lovely smell. Not too feminine or masculine, very natural, vaguely redolent of the tropics. Holding his finger over the top of the bottle, he tipped it upside down and right side up again, then licked what remained. Nearly tasteless, too. Based on its simple ingredients, he didn’t really expect much. Nutty, maybe. How had Sherlock known that this was the one he had been looking at? 

He knew that Sherlock would know if there was any missing, and he was so weirded out by Sherlock’s “data collection” that the bottle went promptly back on the shelf and John let the hot water wash away the day.

When he got out, Sherlock had thankfully abandoned his project and now sat in his chair, laptop balanced on his knees.

“I got rid of the samples,” he said when John had come back from dressing. 

“You didn’t need to.”

“It made you uncomfortable.”

“A little. Look, Sherlock, if you want personal things from people, you usually have to ask permission first. And hair is pretty personal.”

“Would you have given me permission?”

“No. Maybe. I don’t know. The point is, you can’t just take.” 

“What if you wanted me to?” Sherlock arched an eyebrow.

“Believe me, Sherlock, you couldn’t take anything from me that I didn’t want you to.”

Another moment. They were getting quite frequent. Was Sherlock _flirting_ with him? That’s the thing about Sherlock - John could never quite tell. 

“I took your hair. It’s not as if you were using it. It wasn’t even attached to your body. You wouldn’t have ever even noticed.”

John huffed out a laugh. “True enough. Still gross. Though I’m quite pleased that I can walk barefoot in here without shit sticking to the bottom of my feet. Leftovers?” he offered as he went in search of last night’s Thai. 

Sherlock made a noncommittal sound that meant that he might eat if John presented it in front of him. 

It was only later that night, as he rubbed his feet together under the duvet that John wished Sherlock would be the braver of them, the one who _would_ take, would steal the moment and run with it all the way to the bedroom.

He suddenly found himself wishing for a small brown bottle above the toilet.

__________________________________________________________________

 

The second day of strange found John back at work, called in on his day off. He got a call from Mrs. Hudson around the lunch hour, wondering if there was special occasion she ought to know about because Sherlock had gone out and come home with all sorts of “exotic green things” and she thought he might be making lime tarts. John assured her he was _not_ baking or cooking or anything of the like - probably just doing some experiments and to ring back should anything sound particularly like explosions or cursing - either of which meant Bad Things were going in in 221b. 

When John did manage to return home after another gruelling shift, Sherlock was nowhere to be seen. John did notice the smell right away, but once properly in the flat the lemony smell was replaced with something a bit more chemical-y. Apparently Sherlock had not only gone to town with his chemistry set, but the entire kitchen, sink, counters, and hob were a complete wreck. It looked like had been distilling something at one point, and a pot full of some dark green liquid was balanced precariously on a burner. John bent down and sniffed it - something pine, astringent, minty. 

Sherlock was so cleaning it all up, if he ever returned home.

It was late when John climbed into bed and opened a book he’d been wanting to read. He fell asleep before he was fifteen minutes into it and dreamed the vague, ephemeral dreams of the exhausted.

__________________________________________________________________

The third morning, John had a bit of a lie-in and by time he woke up, Sherlock was gone again. His flatmate’s strange hours never bothered John much; it was part of the arrangement. John found the kitchen usable and Sherlock’s equipment back to being confined to the kitchen table. Impressive. Maybe Sherlock was trying to make up for his transgressions of personal space. He went to the bathroom to shower.

There, on the sink counter, was a clear plastic bottle full of a dubious-looking liquid. It was labeled, clearly with Sherlock’s writing in permanent marker: JOHN. 

John frowned at the bottle, picked it up, and went to find his phone. 

The series of texts that followed left him even more confused:

****

**?**

**Shampoo. -SH**

**?**

**I made it. For you. -SH**

**No way.**

**Safe. Tested yesterday. Do not eat. -SH**

**Where are you?**

**Gathering supplies. Be back later. -SH**

****

Then, a full two minutes later,

****

**It’s a gift. -SH**

****

 

A gift? Sherlock, so far, had only given genuine gifts. He rarely gave them on holidays where gift-giving was usually obligatory, but occasionally they would appear: rare imported tea, an antique anatomy text, a Treat Box from Patisserie Valerie (which he actually let John enjoy without making snide commentary about his caloric intake or stealing half of it for himself.) John would ask why, and Sherlock would shrug and simply say, “I knew you would like it,” and John did. For as many times as Sherlock put him in precarious, dangerous, or embarrassing positions, he had yet to completely fail at gift-giving. Trusting Sherlock Holmes with a homemade chemical solution, however, was another thing entirely. 

Against his better judgement, John used the shampoo, praying that he wouldn’t go blind or break out in hives.

As it turned out, the shampoo was completely harmless. It was actually quite nice; it lathered well and had a faintly minty odor. 

Sherlock didn’t return home and an hour’s research through the usual internet news sources turned up nothing promising case-wise, so John dressed and called Lestrade, hoping something was brewing that would get Sherlock’s attention off personal grooming and back onto crime. Lestrade had nothing to offer but a pint after work, John left the flat and made himself busy the rest of the afternoon. 

___________________________________________________________________

“Why on earth do you keep staring at me?” John finally asked Lestrade, suddenly feeling self conscious. “Do I have something...?” He ran a hand over the top of his head. 

They’d been a good hour at Greg’s team’s regular haunt, half-heartedly watching the rugby and eating crisps when John noticed Greg’s unusual interest. They were both on their third pint of bitter but far from drunk; it wasn’t one of those nights. 

“Sorry,” muttered Greg, and looked elsewhere. “It’s just that...your hair. Looks different.”

“Different?”

“Yeah.”

“How so?”

“I don’t know. Good. Quite fetching, even. Did you get it cut or something?”

John let out a laugh. “New shampoo, I guess. Okay, so you have to hear what Sherlock did now...” He spun the story the same way he would have on his blog. John was a good storyteller, although Sherlock was always criticising his penchant for flowery prose or over-exaggeration. “Why waste the time with the _story_ , John,” he’d say, “when it’s the facts that matter?” 

Greg listened, snorting into his beer at the appropriate moments.

“So,” John concluded, “we’ve got seven bottles of ridiculously priced shampoo and shit on the shelf, and he decides to make his own.”

“He doesn’t want you to use the expensive ones. He’s hoarding them for himself.”

“Likely. Selfish git.”

“Jesus, John. The man’s brilliant, but completely barking. I don’t know how you actually live with him.”

“It’s not boring, for sure.” That was the thing. Living with Sherlock was never boring. It was actually...comfortable, in a strange way. Sherlock needed him. If a bottle of homemade shampoo was his way of saying sorry or thanks, so be it. He’d take it. 

Lestrade frowned into his beer. “John,” he began.

Uh-oh. Here it came again. “Let’s not talk about him anymore.”

“I’m not an expert on relationships or anything, God knows, but you two...”

“No, Greg. This has been a strange enough week as it is. I do _not_ want to have some kind of man-to-man deep relationship talk with you right now, okay? Sherlock and I...we’re just...” John sighed. That was the problem, wasn’t it. They were “just”. Just friends, just flatmates, just an inseparable pair. “We’re just us,” he settled for. “Sherlock doesn’t _do_ relationships. He despises them. Always prattling on about how inhibiting they are.”

“Well, then you’re both daft. You two have been in a _relationship_ for ages.”

“Nope.”

Lestrade threw up his hands. “John, he made you shampoo.”

Well, there wasn’t much to say to that, now, was there. John was actually relieved at the sound of a text alert. He pulled the phone from his pocket. 

****

**ETA? -SH**

**At pub with L.**

**Need you at home. -SH**

**Require your assistance. -SH**

**In pain. Come soon. -SH**

****

“I’ve got to go, mate,” said John, shaking his head with a smile. 

“And you should see yourself.” Lestrade shook his head. “You are practically besotted, John Watson. The sooner the two of you two pull your heads from your arses, the better, I say.”

John stood and handed Greg enough to cover his share of the tab. He held his hands out in a gesture of defeat. “Duty calls. Get him a case, okay?”

“Hey John,” Lestrade called after him. “Your hair is gorgeous!”

__________________________________________________________________

The first thing that John noticed was that the flat smelled wonderful. Like caramel and honey and tea. The second thing John noticed was that one of Sherlock’s Egyptian cotton sheets lay in shreds on the floor. 

“Where are you?” he called, instantly alarmed.

“It really hurts, John,” Sherlock growled from behind the door of the loo.

“What on earth did you do to yourself?” John leaned against the door frame and pictured all sorts of disasters: skin lesions, chemical burns, glass splinters - for all he knew, Sherlock had got himself beaten up. Rarely did Sherlock complain of pain; he could probably simply will it away like he did with hunger and fatigue.

“You have to help me. I can’t do this by myself.”

“Are you going to let me in?”

“Please don’t laugh.”

“Can’t guarantee that.”

The doorknob turned, the door opened, and John was met with a nearly-naked Sherlock. John couldn’t help it. The laugh bubbled up from somewhere deep inside him and he choked on it when he saw Sherlock’s eyes - the man was truly distraught. This was so not how he pictured seeing Sherlock’s body for the first time.

For there, standing much like a guilty child, was all six feet of Sherlock Holmes, in nothing but black pants and randomly-placed strips of sheeting that were somehow attached to his body with something sticky. 

“I can’t take them off,” he said with a pout. “I tried, and it hurts too much.”

John tried to keep his diaphragm from spasming in mirth. “Good Lord, Sherlock, are you waxing yourself?”

“Sugaring. It’s supposed to be gentler. I watched it being done and it looked perfectly bearable and...”

John reached up to Sherlock’s right pectoral, where a good-sized strip was stuck to his skin, and ripped.

“Fucking hell!” Sherlock shouted and batted John away. John had never heard him curse so fluently. It was kind of a turn on. Well, it would have been, had it been elicited under different circumstances. 

John held up the strip. “There’s barely any hair on it, you idiot. It couldn’t have hurt that badly.”

“I have very, very sensitive skin!” Sherlock yelled.

“Then why are you trying to take the hair off it? You’re not even hairy!” John stepped back and did a clinical observation. He had played scenarios of getting Sherlock naked so many times in his mind - this was not one of them, and it was _far_ from romantic. “Who are you trying to impress, anyway?”

Sherlock opened his mouth and promptly closed it again. “I had a hypothesis,” he said at length.

“And how’s it working for you?”

“Unclear. But I’m beginning to think I may have been incorrect.”

John reached for the other strip on Sherlock’s chest. He tried very hard not to look at the color and texture of his skin, at the constellations of freckles and moles here and there, at a flat nipple right in front of him or the trail of hair that started just under his navel and disappeared into those black pants...

Sherlock shrunk back.

“You want me to help you or not?”

Sherlock’s eyes were practically watering. “Yes.”

“Then keep talking. It’s best if you don’t think about it. Stare at the ceiling. Recite the periodic table or something.”

Taking a deep breath, Sherlock began listing the London bus routes - in alphabetical order.

John stepped into doctor mode and removed the rest of the strips with precision, smiling at the curses that fell from Sherlock’s lips. “There you go,” he announced after the last one, “all done.” Sherlock collapsed on the edge of the tub as John picked up the remains of Sherlock’s sheet and tossed them into the trash. “You’re going to look a bit strange while it grows back. Not that anyone will notice.”

Sherlock now sported several red bald patches - one on his calf, his upper thigh, his forearm, his belly, his chest, and his foot. None of these locations had been profusely hairy. Sherlock had, from what John could tell, just an average amount on his legs and under his arms, and what he had was fairly fine. He refused to think about what was under those black pants. 

“Thank all that is holy you didn’t touch your eyebrows.” 

Sherlock knitted those eyebrows together, the little wrinkle forming horizontally between them. “Should I? They are rather sizeable.”

John crouched down to where Sherlock was sitting. “Your eyebrows are fine. Now Sherlock Holmes, listen to me. I don’t know what kind of crisis you’re going through, but leave your body well alone. Transport, remember. Let’s get back to transport. Take a bath or something. Wash that stuff off - wait a second, Sherlock.” John stood and picked up the bowl that contained the sticky concoction. “What exactly is in this?”

“Water. Sugar. Lemon. Chamomile extract.” 

“You’re kidding.”

Sherlock gave John a cold look.

“Well, _genius_ , you basically made ice-lolly mixture. It _dissolves in water._ ”

Sherlock blinked at him. 

“You could probably have just taken a hot bath and those would have fallen right off.”

John took one look at Sherlock’s purpling face and beat a hasty retreat.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks, Roisin Barker!


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Mycroft makes an appearance, Sherlock makes a confession, and John finds himself in exceptionally good spirits.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's Corpus Hominis, now with plot!
> 
> Again, infinite thanks to Betty Swallocks, who keeps me entertained and doesn't laugh too hard at my poor attempts to sound British. I had to draw the line at the use of "health farm," however, which American audiences just wouldn't get. Health farm. LOLS.

__  
In this head the all-baffling brain,  
In it and below it the makings of heroes.  
-Walt Whitman  
____________________________________________

John felt as if he woke up in some strange alternative universe, one in which it was routine for Sherlock and his older brother to take tea together from the best china pot. For there they were this morning, Mycroft sitting in John’s chair eating scones that he had undoubtedly brought with him, looking for all the world like a completely normal, functioning family. 

Mycroft stood, ever polite, and smiled. John decided long ago that the Holmes brothers’ smiles were one of three types: genuine, false...or wicked. This one was actually genuine. Mycroft, as far as John could tell, _appreciated_ John and trusted him to take care of his little brother. John was sure the elder Holmes also knew his deeper feelings for Sherlock, but if he did, he never let on. John wished he could put more faith in Mycroft, but his allegiances were devoted to Sherlock, no matter how good Mycroft’s intentions were. The brothers used each other as they saw fit. John sometimes felt a bit of pity at their estrangement, but, as he knew from experience, sibling relationships were far from easy. Especially when one of them was a brilliant addict and the other wielded an enormous amount of power. 

“Ah, John. Good to see you. I do hope you’ll be able to accompany Sherlock on a...little favour for me.”

John raised an eyebrow. “Little favour? Your ‘favours’ are never _little_ , Mycroft.”

“Neither are my brother’s.”

“May I?” John pointed to the bag of scones. Mycroft had excellent taste in scones.

Mycroft nodded. “Please.”

Sherlock sat there, sipping his tea, staring at some place on the wall. “Go and pack a bag, John,” he said.

“Wait. What? We’re going?”

“Yes.”

“Just like that. No complaining, no theatrics...?”

“No.”

“Don’t worry, John, I think you will find this case,” said Mycroft, his mouth quirking in a very Holmsian expression, “relaxing. If Sherlock solves it in ample time, that is. Do try to enjoy yourself. I will, of course, cover your expenses.” 

Mycroft nodded at his brother, who nodded back, then went to collect his umbrella and coat. “I’ll send a car in half an hour. Your help is appreciated.”

John waited to hear the door downstairs close before he took his spot across from Sherlock to eat his scone - they were delicious - and pour himself tea. 

“Sherlock, I know you haven’t been...quite you...this week, but this is just bizarre.”

“He is my brother.”

“...and you hate him.”

“I don’t _hate_ him. I find him irritating, pompous, cold, and insufferable.”

“Oh. Yes. Forgive me.”

Sherlock looked rather blank. “I owe him a favour. He called it in.” 

John was genuinely concerned. The obsession with hair - as strange as it was, that was, well, Sherlock. His so easily acquiescing to his brother's request was alarming. “Hey, Sherlock.” John waited for those unusual eyes to meet his own. “Are you OK?”

Sherlock pulled a face. “Of course.” And then, sombrely, “I’d tell you if I weren’t.”

“I don’t think you would,” John said quietly back. If there was something _emotional_ going on in Sherlock’s amazing brain, he usually kept it to himself, except on very rare instances when a case was particularly gruesome - or if he couldn’t solve it.

“So, there’s a case?” John asked when Sherlock had failed to say anything more. That snapped him out of his reverie, and the confused vague look of earlier was replaced with interested glee. 

“Indeed! Now, eat up, get dressed, and pack! We’ll be gone for the weekend.”

“It will take you that long to solve it?” John asked with a smile as he crammed the last of the scone into his mouth. 

“Oh no. But I should say Mycroft is right. You will enjoy yourself, that is if we don’t make a mess of it.”

“Dangerous?” John was actually looking forward to some action - it had been a while since they ran anyone down on foot, been beaten up, or shot at.

“Not unless you consider aromatherapy and hot stone massage menacing.”

Sherlock wasn’t lying. No wonder he agreed so readily. “No,” said John, trying to sound serious. “No, no, no, absolutely not.”

“Cheer up, John!” Sherlock cried, his eyes shining with new-case mania. “We’re going to a spa retreat!”

________________________________________________________

 

Sherlock seemed preoccupied with his phone as Mycroft’s car crawled out of London proper. It was only when patches of green occasionally appeared at the side of the M1 that John broke his silence.

“You do this to me on purpose, don’t you?”

“Hm?”

“Not tell me anything until I can’t take it any more.”

Sherlock gave a closed-lip smile in affirmation. “We’re going to Willow Cross,” he offered, pocketing his phone and settling back in his seat. 

“Willow Cross? _The_ Willow Cross?”

“Mycroft’s a regular.”

“Shit. He would be, wouldn’t he? I had a girlfriend once whose dream was to stay there.” He cut himself off before he said, “for our honeymoon.” John had considered marrying her, but he wasn’t ready and she wanted children immediately...it would have never worked, and he let the poor girl go. Within a year she was happily married with a baby on the way. It was for the best, really. Funny he should remember her obsession with the resort destination. 

Willow Cross was Britain's premier hotel and spa resort, winning awards left and right for accommodation and spa services. The hotel itself was a nineteenth-century mansion and a Grade II listed building set on a sprawling 30-acre wooded estate. Their prices were staggering. Even if relaxing spa weekends were John’s thing - which they weren’t - he would have never been able to afford it.

“So what’s going on at Willow Cross that’s got you so interested? Embezzlement? Blackmail?” He lowered his voice dramatically. “Murder most foul?”

“To be honest, Mycroft said very little. Apparently there’s something dodgy going on in the spa.” Sherlock waggled his eyebrows, and they looked at each other before breaking up into laughter. 

“Stop,” said John, “I don’t want to even picture it. Please tell me we’re not going to investigate dodgy spa practices.”

“We are.”

“Sherlock, what’s gotten into you? First, you’re collecting my hair, then you’re making shampoo and trying to wax yourself and now we’re going to a spa. Please tell me what’s going on.”

“There’s nothing _going on_. I’m just interested, that’s all.”

“Forgive me for saying, but your being interested in living bodies is a bit worrying.”

Sherlock turned to the window and muttered something that, to John, sounded remarkably like the words “Body. Singular.”

“What?” Sometimes John was positive Sherlock talked to the windows just to make himself harder to hear. “Whose?”

“Does it matter?”

 

“Yes.”

Sherlock shrugged his shoulders. An answer was not forthcoming. 

“You’re exasperating, you know? If it matters, I’m rather concerned. You think you know a man, and then it turns out you know nothing whatsoever.”

Sherlock looked mildly put out. “You know more about me than anyone else does.”

“How could I?” John felt an itch of irritation bloom somewhere in his chest. “You never tell me anything.”

“Not true. I speak to you even when you’re not there.”

“Important things, Sherlock!”

“Everything I tell you is important.”

“No, it’s not. You’ve told me all the things you _know_. Perfumes, tobacco ash, decomposition rates, blood spatter patterns, every crime ever committed ever committed in the history of the Underground... but I know nothing about your childhood, your prior relationships, your hopes, dreams, fears...things that best mates should know.”

“Is that what we are? Best mates?”

“Yes!” John practically yelled. It was his turn to look out the window. “Or at least you’re mine.” 

“My childhood is unimportant and irrelevant. I have very few prior relationships that I want to discuss because they are not pleasant to recall. And you already know my hopes, dreams, and fears.”

Did he? John _wished_ he knew Sherlock’s hopes, dreams, and fears. What did Sherlock hope for? Cases. Puzzles. Things to figure out. His dreams? Who the hell knew. He didn’t want fame or money. As far as fears, John knew Sherlock was terrified of failure. But beyond that? 

As far as John could tell, Sherlock had compartmentalized most matters of the heart in favour of those of the brain. John knew that Sherlock cared for him. Maybe he just had no clue how to show it, except for random yet perfect gifts or in the strains of late-night composing on his violin. Those would work; John would take what he could get. But sometimes it would just be nice for to hear him _say_ it. Or show it with kissing. Kissing would be nice.

The car left the M1 and began heading west into the countryside. They passed two small villages before Sherlock spoke again. 

“When I was seven our family went to the Dorset coast for a summer holiday. It was pleasant. I enjoy swimming.” 

Well, that was something. John’s eyes widened, but he kept staring out the window. 

“On the third day I went exploring. It had rained in the night and the ground was rather slippery. I had climbed a small hill to get a better view of the English Channel but lost my footing and slid. Unfortunately for me, I was wearing nothing but my swimming shorts when I landed in a patch of stinging nettles. Mycroft heard my cries and came to my aid. Mummy showed him how to soothe the stings with dock leaves. Mycroft stayed up all night and read me _Gulliver’s Travels_. In the morning he washed the welts with vinegar. He had a gentle hand. Nothing had ever felt so painful or so comforting. That was the day I discovered my skin, John.”

John turned from the window, astounded. He was vaguely aware his mouth was open. He shut it. “What happened between you two?” he asked at length.

 

“Another time,” said Sherlock. He suddenly sounded tired, as if the revelation had stolen all of his emotional energy. It probably had. “To be honest with you, I am not sure how to approach this situation. Mycroft said, ‘use discretion’, which you know is not exactly my strong suit. The best way we can see the inner workings of the spa is by being clients. You are right that I am finding this whole business of ‘pampering’ and grooming interesting, but I am uncomfortable with the idea of being an active participant.”

“Wouldn’t want anyone seeing your bald spots, would you?” John offered, trying to lighten the mood.

Sherlock huffed. “That was incredibly painful!”

“Wuss.”

“And I figured that you wouldn’t mind a bit. Being” - he made a distasteful face - “massaged.”

“Damn right I wouldn’t. Wait - there’s more to it, isn’t there?”

“Indeed. The spa has a exclusive VIP package which they unimaginatively call ‘The Fountain of Youth.’ According to the website, it’s a ‘four hour experience of well-being’ that involves a bath, exfoliation, and massage.”

“You want me to take a fancy bath and get a massage.”

“Yes.”

“What’s so unusual about this ‘Fountain of Youth’, then? Sounds like a standard spa package, from what I can tell.”

“It costs £850.”

“ _What_? Well, that’s clearly a rip-off.”

“Mycroft’s done it.”

“With whose line of credit?”

“Three times.”

“Shit.”

“He says it’s like nothing else he’s ever experienced, euphoric even, which is why he’s so keen for me to investigate. He says there’s a waiting list. Something’s not right.”

“At £850. Jesus. You’re telling me.”

“This is not my area, John,” Sherlock said as the car pulled up to the estate. It was gorgeous, absolutely gorgeous. Spring had finally broken through and the grounds were manicured and the trees were all flowering, the mansion looking stately and proud at the end of a long driveway. Lines from _Macbeth_ floated somewhere in the back of John’s mind. “This is a place for bodies, John. Bodies are _your_ area. I’m going to need your help.”

Bodies _were_ his area. Finally, something in which John did have expertise. It wasn’t invading Afghanistan, but it would do. 

“Say it again.”

Sherlock rolled his eyes. “I need your help.”

“Right then,” said John as they pulled up to the grand reception entrance. “For once, then, do as I say and try not to get us kicked out.” He wanted to laugh at the absurdity of the situation. “You know, Sherlock,” he said, popping his back as the driver gathered their bags, “I _am _feeling rather stiff.”__

__“Yes,” said Sherlock, chuckling darkly, “I’m sure that was Mycroft’s problem as well.”_ _

___________________________________________________________________ _

__John assured Mycroft’s driver and assistant that he could handle things from there, and took a moment to gather his thoughts. It was a pleasant day and the air was sweet and fresh - a welcome change from the city. In the distance he could hear the musical notes of a fountain._ _

__“You’re a horrible actor, John” said Sherlock, shouldering his bag and holding open. “You’ll give it all away.”_ _

__“Not going to act.”_ _

__“Well, we can’t just walk in here and tell them we’re on a case, now, can we? It would ruin the element of surprise.”_ _

__“Not planning on it. Trust me, all right? Just go make yourself busy and give me a moment.”_ _

__

__He got an arched eyebrow as a reply, and Sherlock, for once, listened. “I think I’ll take a walk, then,” he said, dropping his bag. “It was a long ride.”_ _

__“Leave your coat,” said John. “Too distinctive.”_ _

__Sherlock nodded, shrugged off the coat, handed it to John, and left._ _

__John felt mirth bubble up inside him as he took the bags and Sherlock’s coat (why was the thing so heavy?) through the foyer to the reception stand. He looked around while he waited for his turn. Someone had done a painstaking job on the restorations; the room, likely once a sitting area of sorts, had rich, dark wood floors and panelling, but was still open and airy, light filtering in from a bank of windows opposite. The furniture was sturdy and upholstered in either leather or brocade; the coat-of-arms of the founding family hung on the wall. He was lost in it when the woman behind the desk caught his attention._ _

__“May I help you?” she asked, smiling the smile of one who is being paid to be exceptionally courteous. She was about John’s age, he supposed, likely of Indian descent._ _

__“Hi. Yes. I’m John Watson. I’m supposed to mention that Mycroft Holmes sent me.”_ _

__Her smile changed in recognition, eyes lighting up. “Ah, yes, Mr. Holmes! Is he with you? I’ve seen him several times over the past month.”_ _

__“No, but his brother is.”_ _

__“Mr. Holmes has a brother?” Ah, there was the moment. “His brother is _Sherlock Holmes_? Oh! You’re _that_ John Watson. Ooh, has there...” she lowered her voice, “...been a murder?”_ _

__“No, no nothing like that.” John smiled his most charming smile. “Mr. Holmes - Mycroft, that is - just thought we could use a bit of a get away. Sherlock’s been working himself ragged and I was beginning to get worried about his health, you know, so when Mycroft suggested a weekend away at his favorite retreat, well, I decided to take him up on it, for his brother’s sake.”_ _

__“Oh, that’s so nice,” she said, and meant it. “Let’s just see here.” She typed a bit at her computer. “We’re completely booked this weekend, but - yes, here it is - a reservation for Holmes. Oh! Someone has a sense of humour.”_ _

__John cocked his head. “How come?”_ _

__“He’s booked one of our honeymoon suites.” She eyed John dubiously for a moment. “I always thought those rumours, well, were just rumours.”_ _

_You’re a horrible actor, John._ “Well, it’s a bit complicated,” he said. It came out easier than he expected. For all the times he’d denied it, insisted on two rooms, rolled his eyes at the assumptions, the truth was horribly easy. Fancy that. “We’d really just like to keep a low profile, if you get my meaning. You know, keep the mystery going.” 

__She nodded conspiratorially. “My lips are sealed. Wow. So, let’s get you two settled in. In your room you’ll find a booklet detailing all of the spa packages, restaurants, grounds, and fitness areas. You can book services via phone or Internet. Tea is between two and five in the main hall. Feel free to explore as you wish. Mr. Holmes is very respected client; we would hate to disappoint his family.” She handed him a key - an actual ornate metal key. “I’ll have your bags sent up right away, Dr. Watson. How shall I recognize Mr. Holmes if I see him? Does he resemble his brother?”_ _

__John laughed. “Call me John. And no, he looks nothing like Mycroft. But you’ll recognise him if you see him. Tall. Cheekbones. Always has his nose where he shouldn’t. Please do let me know if he becomes too much trouble. Getting him to relax will be a challenge.”_ _

__“Don’t worry about that, John. That’s our job. My name is Navya, should you need anything, please ask. I’m on most of the weekend.”_ _

__John thanked her and went in search of their room. He found it with little problem, but he took his time getting there, looking at all the paintings along the corridors and pausing to look out windows at the sprawling grounds._ _

__He said a silent prayer of thanks that the door didn’t have “Honeymoon Suite” or other such nonsense on it (not that it would, at a place like this, but still) and let himself in. He was standing in the middle of it, staring, when his phone chimed._ _

__**Location? -SH** _ _

__**Your brother is a bastard.** _ _

__**I know exactly where you are. Be there momentarily. -SH** _ _

__John took it all in - the flowers, champagne, candles, ridiculously plush bed - threw back his head, and laughed._ _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Willow Cross is loosely modeled after Hoar Cross Hall Spa Resort, which, obviously, I have never visited. I've taken great liberties with it, but if you'd like to see what's in my mind as I write, look here: http://www.hoarcross.co.uk/


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which John tests the waters and gets his feet wet...so to speak.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> After careful consideration, I have decided NOT to mention any of the episodes in the series. I didn't want to fit this story within the timeline. This would never happen in the series, so let's just let this exist on its own, in some happy little land where the unresolved sexual tension always gets resolved. Hope you're down with that.

Chapter 7

John lay on the bed, flipping through the beautifully-bound book that detailed the history of the estate, the grounds, and the spa. After booking a dinner reservation for six o’clock, he’d opened the windows and a breeze filled the spacious room with a subtle spring sweetness. It would be perfectly idyllic if Sherlock’s angry voice wasn’t coming through the wooden door that separated the bathroom (which was larger than John’s room at Baker Street) from the suite proper. 

For once, John felt perfectly at ease. Something about his pseudo-confession to the woman at the front desk eased six months’ worth of mental exhaustion. The situation was just too hilarious to get worked up about. He and Sherlock, together in the honeymoon suite at a preposterously posh spa resort set up by the world’s most pretentious older sibling. John decided right there and then that he was going to drink the champagne, order the most expensive meals he could, and sleep nude in those magnificent sheets, regardless of what Sherlock - or his brother - thought. 

Sherlock, however, seemed to be incredibly upset. Usually the commentary and speculation about their supposed sexual relationship didn’t bother the detective in the least. He never seemed to care what other people thought of him and never understood why John did. “People see what they want to see, John,” he always said, and dismissed the knowing looks and speculative glances without pause. 

Five minutes ago, however, Sherlock entered Willow Cross’ honeymoon suite with a distinct frown. His eyes, darting around the room, taking in every detail as he did every time he entered a new space, took on a vaguely horrified look, and he turned promptly and locked himself in the bathroom. (John didn’t even bother how he knew which door led to where - there were several.)

So John removed his shoes, took off his jumper and slung it over a chair, and flopped down on the bed to read about the resort. It was hard to concentrate when clearly Sherlock was talking about him, to Mycroft, no less. John heard a few distinctive phrases: “personal life”, “embarrass John”, and “don’t need your help.” When Sherlock emerged, spots of colour tinged his cheeks.

“I apologise. I’ll have this sorted out in a moment,” he said sourly.

“Don’t,” John replied, still looking at the book.

“Pardon?”

“Don’t bother. This is likely the best room this place has. If you’re brother’s footing the bill, then I say we spend liberally and make him wish he’d never asked you for favours in the first place.”

John heard Sherlock laugh bitterly as he took a seat next to the open window.

“Besides, I’m not embarrassed.”

John looked up to see Sherlock run a hand through his hair - a gesture of exasperation. “You’re always embarrassed when we share a room.”

“Well, I’m not now.”

“You do understand the implications of this particular room, do you not?”

John rolled over, tucked his arms under his head, and looked at the ornate ceiling. “Of course. But you know, Sherlock, I find that I can’t really be arsed. You’ve got a case, I’m going to relax, have a nice massage, eat like a pig, and we’re going to have a proper holiday. I couldn’t give a fuck about what anyone thinks right now.”

Sherlock was quiet for a moment, then laughed. “You amaze me, John Watson.”

“Ta. Now,” he said, hoisting himself from the comfortable bed, “I booked us in for dinner tonight, regardless of whether you’re eating. We’ve got three hours. Let’s go and check out this spa.”

_____________________________________________________________ 

 

If Sherlock was impressed by their surroundings, he didn’t let on. John, however, was appropriately astounded. The spa itself was an elegant building at the back of the original hall, connected to the mansion by a garden in which water cascaded from one stone pool to another. In quiet corners, water lilies bloomed and the golden bodies of ancient koi carp swam slowly between their stalks. The climbing roses covering the trellis that acted as a natural roof were just beginning to bloom; one or two more days of sun and the place would be a riot of colour and scent. John was so entranced by the garden he nearly let Sherlock be the one to enter the spa first - and that was just not going to do. 

“Hey,” he called, catching up. “Discretion, remember?”

“Feeling confident, are you?”

“Especially. Now, shut up, stand there, and try to look stressed out.” It wouldn’t be a stretch. Even without his ubiquitous coat and scarf, Sherlock was meticulously dressed in a suit and couldn’t look more uptight if he tried. 

“After you,” Sherlock said, holding the door open for him. 

John summoned all of his Watson charm and approached the reception desk. 

“Hello. Do you have a booking?” the woman behind the counter asked.

“Actually, no. May I speak to Lillian?”

She instantly looked concerned. “Is there a problem, sir?”

“Oh, no,” said John, smiling, “We have a mutual friend, so I was hoping to drop in and say hello.”

“Just a moment. I’ll see if she’s available. She actually gives some of the speciality massage packages herself. May I mention your friend’s name?”

“Mycroft Holmes,” said Sherlock politely. 

“Oh! Of course. Just a moment.”

She disappeared. 

“Lillian?” asked Sherlock, raising an eyebrow. He looked impressed. 

“Spa manager. I read about her in the book upstairs while you were having your tiff with Mycroft. She’s got degrees in Hospitality and Management.”

“Do we have to keep dropping his name?” Sherlock said with distaste. 

“Seems he’s well known around here. It’s going to get us what we want much faster. And the faster you solve the case, the faster I can relax. Just go with it, Sherlock.”

“My brother is well-known wherever he goes. He loves the sound of his own name.”

“Hmm. I guess that’s where you get it from.”

“I do _not_ love the sound of my own name.”

“Yes you do. It’s why you make me say it four times before you acknowledge that I’m speaking to you.”

“Maybe I just like the way you say it.”

John opened his mouth for a reply and found that nothing came out. 

At that moment, the receptionist returned with the manager. Lillian, despite her small stature, exuded confidence, practicality and sex appeal from the top of her sleek blonde head to the tips of her sports sandals. John knew immediately that if he wasn’t, as Lestrade put it, a bit besotted with a certain lanky six-foot plus consulting detective with bald patches, he would be doing anything in his power to get to know this woman better. Or at least, get a better look down her purple scoop-necked T-shirt.

John realised that he was staring a bit when Sherlock cleared his throat. 

“Hi,” he said, extending his hand. “John Watson. This is Sherlock Holmes. Mycroft, his brother, gave us a bit of a surprise this weekend and sent us up here for a bit of relaxation. He told me to ask for you in particular. Says you give one hell of a massage.”

Lillian laughed, and John couldn’t help but smile. “That’s flattering.” She held out her hand. “Lillian Gleason,” she said, firmly shaking John’s hand and then extending hers to Sherlock. Miraculously, Sherlock took it. “I didn’t know Mr. Holmes had a brother,” she said to him, grey eyes twinkling. 

John couldn’t tell if Sherlock looked put out or thankful.

“We’ve only recently been on speaking terms again,” said Sherlock. “We’re trying to reconcile old differences. This is his way of apologising, I imagine.”

“Mr. Holmes has been a client here for many years. He’s rather pleased with our newest package, but then again, most of our clients are. There’s nothing like being able to truly relax and clear your mind, now, is there?”

Sherlock’s face betrayed nothing. John instantly recalled half a dozen instances where Sherlock had literally yelled about how “lucky” John was to have such a simple, quiet mind. “I just can’t turn it off, John,” he’d say. “It’s not a tap.” And then he’d flop onto the couch dramatically and scowl. If anyone needed to clear his mind once a while, it was Sherlock.

“Well, now, gentlemen, how may I help you?” 

“To be honest,” said John, hoping Sherlock wouldn’t interrupt, “I’m really curious about the art of massage. I was shot in the shoulder a few years ago and have a bit of a dodgy leg. I did some physio a while ago, but haven’t kept it up. Willing to try something new to help through the rough patches. I’m a doctor and would really like to give accurate advice when my patients ask whether massage is truly therapeutic. Sherlock here - well, he can just never seem to relax.” 

All true. No acting needed. 

“So I wondered, if you could spare the time, if you could show us around your spa. Mycroft has said so much about it. We’d just like to learn a bit more before we dive right in. You know, get a behind-the-scenes look. That is, if you don’t mind.”

“No, not at all! Anything for a Holmes. I’ve got a client in an hour, but I have some time before that. Let me just finish up some loose ends and I’ll be right back.” She gave them another beautiful smile and left. John was mesmerised by her blonde ponytail as it swished back and forth between her shoulder blades.

As soon as she was out of sight, Sherlock steered John over to the windows overlooking the garden. “You were flirting with her,” he accused under his breath.

“Of course. You’re not the only one who can flirt as a means to an end, you know.”

“You’re usually so _bad_ at it.”

“I am not!”

“I read your e-mails, John.”

“Are you suggesting I should take lessons from you?”

“I _did_ make Molly drop a clipboard.”

John laughed. “That’s not flirting. It’s manipulation. Look, Sherlock, I’ve got us this far, alright? Trust me. Bodies, remember. _My_ area. Women. _My_ area. Do _not_ try to outflirt me today. You’ll balls it up and then I will not get my massage or my steak and I swear to God that there will be hell to pay if I have to share a honeymoon suite with you and don’t get to enjoy the perks that come with it.”

“But...”

“I’m not interested in her, if that’s what you’re worried about. Case, remember? She could be some serial killer for all I know.” _And she has never made me shampoo,_ John thought. 

“You think she’s attractive.”

“She is. Point?”

Sherlock shut his mouth and kept it closed. 

_______________________________________________________

 

“Wow.”

“Yes, it really is something, isn’t it?”

“That’s one way of putting it.” 

John was trying to not gape at the pool area and failing horribly. The place sort of reminded him of Roman baths - tall ceilings, marble floors, supporting columns, the faint gurgle of water.

Lillian explained the spa’s mission and various health philosophies in the manner of a superior holiday rep as they were steered past numerous bathing areas, each more ornate and inviting than the last. John inhaled the warm, humid air, watched the ponytail swing, and tried especially hard not to imagine Sherlock’s perfect buttocks stuffed into tight, black Speedos. He could daydream a bit; no doubt Sherlock was picking up every watery fact and would recall them all later. 

“This is the main pool, kept at 28 degrees for comfort but not too warm for swimming. It took nearly a year to lay the tiles,” she added, indicating the millions of tiny turquoise glass squares. “The lions” - lion heads were carved into the pillars and water spouted from their mouths - “are in homage to Harold Leybourne’s, the founder of the estate, coat-of-arms. His great-grandson owns it now.” John had seen the coat-of-arms and the founder’s portrait in the Hall’s main entry, followed by formal portraits of the Leybourne patriarchs up until the current owner, Phillip Leybourne, who’d clearly inherited Harold’s weak chin and short legs, too.

“Over here is the leisure lagoon,” she continued, gesturing towards the back of the room. This pool was much more private than the first one they’d seen; no natural light reached here. It was lit mainly with hanging lanterns and shrouded in steam coming from opaque, turquoise water. A young couple had situated themselves in a corner, smiling coyly at one another. “This one’s pleasantly warm but not scorching; we add minerals to help relax the muscles and purify it with salt instead of chlorine. Not for swimming, obviously,” she added, smiling, before continuing on. John lingered - he wouldn’t mind plopping in now and staying there the rest of the night. 

“And this is the hydrotherapy bath..” She led them past a circular pool where two older women and a man well into his seventies were chatting and laughing as the strong jets worked their shoulders and backs. John wondered whether or not it was safe for people that old to be in such hot water. Lillian beat him to it. “Ten minutes for those over sixty,” she said quietly. “And no longer than half an hour for everyone else.” John nodded. That sounded about right.

Just being in the spa was so comforting that John found himself unable to think quite clearly. The water looked so inviting and warm and comfortable... Sherlock, on the other hand, was revelling in data. John loved to watch him think; it was such a visible process. For a while he had watched Lillian, who was too busy explaining to notice his scrutiny. Then he turned his attention to the guests and the pools and the decor. 

At one point, John felt Sherlock watching _him_ , which wasn’t out of the ordinary. Sherlock had said, at multiple points in time, that watching John’s reactions could lead him to various conclusions he might ought to not catch otherwise. It was one of the most flattering things John had ever heard from the detective. And, after all this time, he really _could_ feel Sherlock’s penetrating stare from across a room. (Sherlock would often complain, _John, you’re thinking too loudly!_ and John would gripe, _Quit staring at me!_ Both of them would be separated by a good ten feet and had not even made eye contact.)

Once she’d shown them the main room, they walked back to the reception area, past a room used as a beauty salon and another very busy area devoted to feet and hands. Finally they reached a corridor flanked by potted rose bushes. These were in bloom and smelled heavenly. “Through here are our massage rooms and VIP areas,” explained Lillian. “Each room is themed - not too overtly, of course - but we’ve tried to incorporate beauty and relaxation practices from all over the world, and thought it would be appropriate to reflect that philosophy into the decor.” 

John again was fully appreciative of the rooms he saw - most were in use, but the Mediterranean (reserved for facials and body treatments), Scandinavian (a massage room), and East Indies (featuring a small, private pool) rooms were vacant. “Who did the decor?” he asked as they passed a closed door marked _Desert Oasis_. “It’s like stepping into another world.”

“I did,” she said proudly. “Well, I commissioned it all, right down to the music and scented candles. I figure if someone’s going to pay good money for an experience, he or she should have _an experience_. Wouldn’t you agree?”

John agreed wholeheartedly. He had envisioned some frilly women-only terrain. This was nothing he could have imagined. No wonder his ex was so keen to come, or why Mycroft was a regular. He would never mock the man for that again.

Sherlock had remained quiet for most of the tour, but something Lillian had said had piqued his interest. 

“I can see why your prices are so exorbitant,” he said, but not with malice.

Lillian laughed. “Well, yes, we have to recoup our costs. Keeping this place running is a tremendous undertaking, and all of our staff are highly-trained professionals whom we compensate well. The products we use come from all over the world and are top-of-the-line. We even make some in-house. We also keep irregular hours, so that our clients can get the most out of their money. The spa is open twelve hours a day, seven days a week. I don’t want to sound discriminatory, Mr. Holmes, but this establishment doesn’t really cater for the hoi polloi.”

“Of course,” replied Sherlock, and said nothing more. 

“I’m afraid that’s all the time I have,” she said, checking her phone and leading them back through the private corridor and to the reception area. “You can check with Melissa to see what’s available yet this weekend. We’ll do our best to accommodate you. We do have a couples’ massage package, if you’re interested. I know we’re fully booked for full-body massage for the rest of the evening, but I’m sure we have openings for other services if you want to try something out now.” 

John thought _shut up_ at Sherlock as hard as he could. “That would be absolutely lovely,” he said. 

“Melissa, see if you can clear up something for them tomorrow,” she said. “A two-hour couple’s block, if you can get it.”

Just then, a nervous-looking woman entered the reception area. John could tell from one glance that she wasn’t well. She looked twitchy, and a faint sheen of sweat covered her brow. Instead of greeting the receptionist, the woman came directly to Lillian, who was on her way back to the VIP area. 

“I can’t wait any longer,” she announced in a shaky voice.

John’s eyebrows came together in concern. He’d seen patients with the flu who looked better than she did.

“I’ll be right with you, Mrs. Jenkins.”

“Please,” the woman whispered. 

“Give me ten minutes.” 

Lillian nodded and smiled at John and Sherlock and left. The woman sat down, crossed her legs, uncrossed them, crossed them again, and then took a handkerchief from her handbag and actually went about wringing it. 

John, concerned, took a seat next to her.

“Excuse me. I’m a doctor, and pardon me for saying so, but you don’t look like you’re feeling well.”

She smiled apologetically. “I supposed I’m not. That’s why I’m here, of course.” John gave her a questioning look. “For the ‘Fountain of Youth.’ Silly name, I know. But it’s the only thing that seems to make me relax. I’ve been so incredibly stressed out and Lillian is so good. I must look a mess.”

John thought 10mg Valium might be a lot more helpful than a massage. 

“She’s that good?” John asked, trying to calm the woman down before she had a stroke.

“Oh, yes. I started coming to her about two months ago. I have never felt so well.”

John frowned. She didn’t look well. At all.

“How many times have you had this particular massage?” Sherlock asked, coming to squat down next to the woman. John tried not to roll his eyes at his friend’s feigned concern - Sherlock was in the wrong line of work. The man deserved an Oscar. 

“Six.”

“In two months.” 

“Well, yes.”

John did the maths. At £850 a pop, the woman had dropped £5100. He could tell exactly what Sherlock was thinking - she couldn’t afford it. Even if she were loaded, it would be a hefty expenditure. 

“It sounds delightful,” said Sherlock, smiling kindly. “Who else can you recommend?”

Mrs. Jenkins looked affronted. “Why, Lillian is the only one who performs ‘The Fountain of Youth’,” she said. 

The phone at the front desk rang, Melissa answered it, and told Mrs. Jenkins that Lillian was ready. 

 

“Oh, thank goodness,” Mrs. Jenkins breathed. She collected her handbag and dashed off without even a polite good-bye.

Sherlock was still squatting on the floor next to her chair. He stood up, brushed at his suit a bit, and then nodded to John to step outside, where they sat on a stone bench in the garden.

“I want to know why a woman carrying a knock-off Hermes Birkin is compulsively purchasing the spa’s priciest package.”

“Dodgy spa practices, indeed,” said John, licking his lip. “OK, I see that there’s something going on here.”

“Mrs. Jenkins is particularly highly-strung.” 

“ _You_ are highly-strung. That’s not highly-strung. She was - I mean, did you see that woman, Sherlock? The look on her face when they called her? She was _relieved_ , completely relieved. She looked like a drug addict.” John glanced at Sherlock, who was picking lint off his trousers. 

“I’m aware of the look.”

“What’s going on back there?” John mused. They sat in silence for a moment, John listening to the fountain and Sherlock presumably lost inside his mind.

 

“John, are you ticklish?” said Sherlock in a perfectly Sherlockian non-sequitur.

“Not particularly.” John creased his eyebrows. “Why?”

“How do you feel about a pedicure?”

And with that, the detective was up and striding back into the spa. 

______________________________________________________

John had flat-out refused a pedicure (Sherlock would have insisted on nail polish and while John may have recently re-evaluated his sexual identity, he was never, ever going to be caught dead with bright pink toes). He did, however, acquiesce to a half-hour foot massage before dinner. 

Melissa gave them a perplexed look at Sherlock’s desire to accompany John but not participate. She showed them both into the “Forest Retreat” room, produced a plush robe and slippers from a cupboard, and told John to enjoy himself.

John began perfunctorily stripping before he thought too hard about it. Sherlock swallowed audibly and turned around. “Would you like me to step out while you undress?” he asked quietly.

While had been in just his dressing gown in front of Sherlock before, there was something awkward about the closeness of the room. “No,” he replied. “It’s a foot massage, Sherlock. Above-ankle nudity is not necessary.” 

He _had_ been naked around so many men before. Why would Sherlock be any different? _Because you want him to see you naked,_ his brain supplied, _only under different circumstances._

John finished undressing, hanging his trousers and shirt in the wardrobe and stashing his socks inside his shoes, before sitting on the treatment table. Sherlock had taken to poking his nose into every bottle he could find. 

“Try not to say anything untoward while I’m getting my feet done, OK?”

“You’re afraid I’m going to embarrass you.” 

“It would be just like you to say something insulting or vulgar just as I let my guard down.”

“Do you want me to leave? Does it embarrass you that I observe?”

John thought about it. He realised that he wasn’t embarrassed at all, actually. He was more concerned about getting kicked out before they had solved the case. What they really needed to see was what was happening a few doors down at the fountain of youth. 

“No, I’m not. Why do you keep asking me that? Are _you_ embarrassed?”

“No,” Sherlock scoffed, as if the very concept of self-consciousness was beneath his contempt.

“Well, then, stop asking. Since when did you care? But did you see her face when you said you wanted to watch?” John laughed.

“What should have I said instead?” Sherlock asked, opening a cabinet and finding its contents uninteresting before moving on to sniff at the candles.

“I don’t know. ‘Watching’ sounds creepy and voyeuristic. You could have said, ‘keep me company,’ instead.”

“That would give people the impression that we’re a couple.”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, Sherlock, take a look around. We’re two blokes staying in the honeymoon suite at a luxury spa resort frequented by sodding _Mycroft_ and you want to be in the same room as I am while a beautiful woman fondles my feet! What does it look like?" 

Sherlock didn’t deign to answer.

“Why don’t you do it, too?”

Sherlock opened a bottle of something, stuck his finger in it, touched it to his tongue, then made a face and hastily recapped it. “Too ticklish.”

“Really.”

“Absolutely.”

“You’re a liar.”

“Well, yes. But not about that.”

“Suit yourself,” said John, lying back on the table and dangling his feet over the side. He thought about all the times he had seen his flatmate’s naked feet. Even his toes were long and slender, like his fingers, and he was prone to wiggling them when bored. “Observe all you want, but don’t ruin it for me.” 

“We’re supposed to be gathering data, John. Find out as much as we can about this place - and about Ms. Gleason and her fountain of youth.”

“Of course. I am in full data-gathering mode. I can multi-task.”

“Can we do it without the flirtation this time?”

“That depends. Go with the flow, Sherlock.”

John heard Sherlock mimic his words under his breath as he sat down on the therapist’s rolling chair. “I hope she’s old and ugly,” he muttered, “and has tiny, weak little hands.”

It was then that it hit him - John was suddenly aware of the bee that had crawled into Sherlock’s bonnet - he was _jealous_. Sherlock Holmes, world’s only consulting detective, had turned into a jealous prat. Oh, this was too good. The whole thing - the hair, the waxing, the stupid, stupid honeymoon suite- it was almost as if the very force of nature were moving the two of them together, telling them to stop acting like idiots and just get on with it. Once the case was solved, John told himself. They’d solve this case, and then, well, then he’d march right up to Sherlock and claim what was his. 

It was at that moment, when John was lying on the table smiling to himself and Sherlock pouting and turning himself around on the stool that the masseuse came in.

“Hello,” he said. “I’m James. Shall we get started?”

John watched Sherlock’s face drain of colour, and as he sat up to shake James’ hand, he noticed that it was not even remotely weak or tiny. Just as well, as James was nearly as tall as Sherlock and probably twice his weight.

_____________________________________________________________

 

“I know this is supposed to be relaxing,” said John as James got out a few towels and a bottle of something from the cupboard, “but do you mind if I ask you about some things while you work? I’m a doctor, and I’m a bit embarrassed to admit that I’ve never had a massage - well, except when I knackered my shoulder.”

“Really? I’m a trainee physio; nearly done. Getting my massage and reflexology qualifications seemed a logical way to make money to pay for university. Where do you work?”

“I was in the RAMC, and I thought I’d eventually find myself in an A&E somewhere, but I seem to have ended up in general practice.”

“Wow. That’s fantastic!”

John was vaguely aware of Sherlock making muted scathing noises from where he had retreated into the corner. Small talk was distasteful to Sherlock, but John had expected him to ask a million questions. Instead he clammed up and looked entirely uncomfortable. He’d shaken James’ hand and introduced himself, at least, but at the moment he was sounding more like a pervert and less like pleasant company. 

“So,” smiled John, ignoring Sherlock, “what does a foot massage usually entail? I’m assuming it begins with some kind of assessment...”

“Sure,” said James, darting his gaze between the two of them, clearly unsure what the hell was going on. “Er...are you on your feet a lot?”

“A fair share.”

“Any exercise?”

“Running, occasionally.”

“Heavy lifting?”

“No.”

“Dancing?”

“Nooo,” John laughed, evoking a mental image of he and Sherlock attempting to Morris Dance in full traditional costume for some obscure case.

“Well,” said James as he began an inspection of John’s feet, “men’s foot massages are more about relaxation than therapy, although you can certainly have a reflexology massage if you’d like. Women’s feet have all sorts of issues from their shoes, so I spend a lot of time relaxing muscles and stretching tendons. The feet carry the weight of the body, and it’s amazing how much pressure they take.”

John looked at Sherlock, who resembled a child banished to the corner for wrongdoing. John propped himself up a bit. “Sherlock, come over here and watch.” In the dim light of the room, Sherlock’s cheekbones looked even more pronounced as he continued to scowl. John smiled at him, a warm smile, one that said _trust me_ and _it’s fine, it’s all fine._

“We had a bit of a bet on this,” said John to James as he settled back down. “Sherlock doesn’t think that a foot massage could possibly have health benefits. To be honest, James, I’m kind of a sceptic myself. I’m completely open to complementary medicine, but reflexology seems a bit of a stretch.”

 _Take the bait, Sherlock_ John thought at him. 

Thankfully, he did. “Forgive me, but caressing one’s feet at certain zones that supposedly correspond to various internal organs to heal specific ailments or stimulate ‘energy pathways’ seems far fetched.” 

“I can see why you might think that. Let’s try a bit of both, then. I’ll do some reflexology, and then show you just a few simple relaxation techniques.” He looked mildly uncomfortable. “I’m, uh, not used to an audience. Usually I just do my thing. Feet are feet - the rest of the person just kind of disappears, unless the client has specific concerns. Are you familiar with a reflexology chart?” he asked Sherlock, who had crept from his corner and moved around to get a better view.

“Yes.”

“I’m not,” said John from further up the table. “Sherlock probably has the damn thing memorised.”

“Why would you do that?” asked James with a confused laugh.

“Eidetic memory.”

“You’re not going to memorise all of this and then start up your own business, are you?” he joked.

“Not my intention,” said Sherlock, voice rumbling. 

“Well, it’s good you don’t know it, John. Is ‘John’ OK?”

“Sure.”

“That way you can see if you get a response from the pressure.”

James ran both of his hands over each of John’s feet a few times, rolling them this way and that, stretching them out and relaxing the muscles before taking John’s right foot in his hands. He started at the heel, using this thumb to inch his way up along the outside of the foot. John had expected something slippery and oily - this was more of an odd, dry pressure. “I’m just feeling the tissue,” said James, “going through each zone, checking for changes in density.” He got up to the little toe, did something like pinching it a few times, and then started back down in the middle of John’s foot, working his way up again. John was feeling pretty ambivalent about the whole thing until James hit something under his middle toes. 

Completely unbidden, John let out a noise that was a strangled cross between pain and pleasure. Sherlock’s head snapped up at the same time John’s did, his eyes wide and searching. 

“Feel something?” asked James, focusing his attention on the area.

“Shit,” said John, swallowing. “Sorry. Wow. How...what is that spot?”

“Shoulder,” whispered Sherlock.

“You really do have quite the memory, don’t you?” asked James. “Yeah, that’s the shoulder. If I just apply pressure here, it gets the energy flowing. Here,” he moved his thumbs slightly to the left, “is the trapezius, and here, the deltoid...”

“Good God,” muttered John. “That’s amazing. Sherlock, are you watching this?”

“Intently, John.”

John let his eyes flutter shut. This beat the hell out of heated pads, exercises, and that hateful rubber band. 

“Any other places that seem to trouble you?” asked James after he’d moved on from John’s right foot and began the same process with the left. 

“No,” said John just as Sherlock said, “his leg.” Their eyes met again - Sherlock’s expression was completely schooled, although John could tell there was something _boiling_ just under the surface. 

James began working along the outside of John’s heel, and while John didn’t feel anything as significant as he did with the shoulder (the limp was _mainly_ psychosomatic) he noticed his whole body had relaxed but not in a sleepy way. He felt revived. A bit blissed out, but revived nonetheless.

He could have left feeling perfectly happy and was feeling a bit dreamy when James announced he’d do the “relaxation” portion. “I’m relaxed,” John announced to the ceiling. He was afraid he sounded a bit drunk.

“These techniques are used more for comfort and relaxation,” explained James as he took the bottle from its location in the heater. “We do a lot of these for couples, and even teach a class once a month. Very popular.” John heard, rather than saw, him pour the liquid and rub it between his palms. He tried to picture Sherlock and himself at a couples’ retreat, Sherlock’s slender feet between his hands. All he could imagine was Sherlock complaining about John ‘doing it wrong.’ Thinking about Sherlock doing it to him was probably not a good idea at the moment. 

“There’s not much to this, really. You just use firm pressure, pay close attention to the arch of the foot and the toes. Spend as much time on the top of the foot as the bottom, not too hard or too soft, but with gentle pressure. Whereas you do the reflexology dry, I’d use some oil - not lotion - if you’re going to do this at home. I’m going to stop talking now and let you enjoy this.”

The first touches were soft and measured, as if James were letting John get used to the sensation, but then he got down to business, stroking one foot and switching over to the next, pressing his thumbs in here, squeezing there. Clearly James had done this hundreds of times and had it down to an art, a strange little dance between hands and feet. It felt remarkably good, and for a moment John had completely forgotten Sherlock was even in the room with him until he heard the chair the detective was sitting in scrape away from James a bit closer to his side. He could _feel_ Sherlock’s presence there, feel his eyes on his face, his feet, roving over his body, could practically _smell_ him. James had changed whatever he had been doing to some kind of rhythmic hand-over-hand thing, and John’s mental train of thought went right where it wasn’t supposed to. 

He was back at Baker Street; they had just returned from a case and were high on adrenaline and success but soaked with rain, tumbling into the living room, shedding wet clothes, wet socks sailing across the room - and then they were in bed, giggling, rubbing their cold feet together, trying to get warm - and then there was Sherlock burrowing under the duvet, his giant hands finding John’s cold feet, rubbing them - and then there was warm, slippery oil on his...

James’ large hands became Sherlock’s , his feet became an extension of his dick and all the messages got crossed. “Oh God, that’s _brilliant_ ,” he groaned, and then realized, mortified, that he’d said it aloud. 

His eyes snapped open to find Sherlock’s boring into them. Several things happened at once: No fewer than six different expressions crossed his face - shock, disbelief, fascination, repulsion, fury, and arousal? - before Sherlock launched himself from his chair and bolted from the room; John pulled his feet from James’ hands and sat up so quickly that he nearly kicked the poor man in the face; James held up his oily hands in a gesture of self-defense. 

“I am _so sorry,_ ” said John. “That was...Jesus...really embarrassing.”

James took a moment to breathe. “What did I do?” he asked, still sitting there with his hands up. “Is he...” he nodded toward the door. “Did I...?”

“No, it’s not you at all,” John said, feeling extremely thankful that the knot in his robe was strategically placed because he had one hell of an erection. “That really was very relaxing. And instructive. Thanks. You’re going to be a wonderful physiotherapist. I just wasn’t...expecting a foot massage to feel so, uh... good,” he managed to get out.

“Oh,” James said at length, wiping his hands on a towel. “Oh! Look, John, it’s a perfectly normal biological response. It’s happened loads of times. I don’t even notice any more.”

John laughed. Normal biological response. How many times had he said that himself? _Bodies were bodies_. Stupid traitorous bodies. “OK, you’ve twigged it. Doesn’t make it any less awful.”

“Not a big deal. My fiancee is constantly amused that I’m saving for our first flat by massaging other people - but she never laughs when I turn these magic fingers on her.” He waggled his ‘magic fingers’ mysteriously.

John chuckled again and then flopped back on the table. If this weekend got any stranger...

“Hey, um, about your friend. Are you two...”

“Sort of. Maybe. It’s complicated,” he said for the second time that day.

“Did I offend him or something? Touching your feet?”

“He’d kill me for saying it, but I’m pretty sure Sherlock had a similar ‘biological response’. Probably scared him to death. I’m either going to be thanking you or cursing your name the rest of the weekend.” 

James smiled. “He needs to relax.”

“Easy for you to say. Hey,” John said, sitting up again, “Lillian was telling me about this special package she does. ‘The Fountain of Youth’? Maybe Sherlock would like that. He’s too ticklish for the feet thing, but I’m sure he’d find it very relaxing.”

“Likely. She has great results.”

“What exactly does she do?” John asked, trying not to sound too nosy.

James put away the oil and put the extra towels in a hamper. “I know it starts with a bath - there’s a tub in that particular room - and then, after a twenty-minute soak or so, the client has an exfoliation with a sugar or salt rub, followed by a reflexology massage. Lillian’s a master of reflexology - she’s completely intuitive. Once she’s finished, the client has nearly an hour to simply meditate or sleep. Most choose sleep. They come out feeling like a new person.”

“Someone up front said she was the only one who did that particular massage.”

“Yeah. It’s her brainchild. She’s actually studied in China and knows much more about the traditional practices and their philosophies than the rest of us do. ‘The Fountain of Youth’ keeps her in high demand, and she’s paid a fortune, but everyone’s so pleased with how she’s turned this place around in the past few years that we don’t really care. Rumor has it that she’s got a boyfriend, but with all the hours she works, I can’t see how she’s got the time. Now,” he said with a smile, “You’d better go and chase after your friend.”

John tied the robe a bit tighter around his waist - just to be safe - before getting off the table. “Dinner,” he said, “is going to be absolute hell.” 

_____________________________________________________________

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, infinite thanks to BettySwallocks, who has really challenged me to become a better writer. I'm having more fun with this than should possibly be allowed.


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Sherlock throws a tantrum, John uncovers a secret, and certain people get naked.

Chapter 8

 

For a horrible ten minutes John was quite positive Sherlock simply wasn’t going to turn up for dinner. He’d gone and changed after his awkward experience in the spa, hoping Sherlock was back in the room, but the detective was nowhere to be found. So John journeyed down to dinner by himself. He said hello to Navya, who appeared to be ending her shift, as he passed by the reception area.

“You, um, haven’t seen Sherlock?” he asked her as she signed off the computer and collected her handbag. 

“Yes! You weren’t kidding about the cheekbones, were you?” She smiled and raised her eyebrows a bit. “He’s out in the gardens, I think. Came through here like a whirlwind a while ago. Hasn’t been back in since. I do hope you’re enjoying yourselves.”

“It’s a very lovely place. Had a foot massage. It was...interesting.”

Navya laughed. “If you want interesting, try the mud wrap. Although something tells me you wouldn’t be that keen on being painted in mud and told to lie still with cucumbers on your eyes.”

“You’d be right.”

“Are you sure you two are just here for rest and relaxation?” Mischief played around her eyes. 

John really was a horrible liar, so he simply told the truth. He was finding it remarkably easy that day. “Mycroft really did send us.”

She gave him a look of feigned acceptance. “Well, if you should need my services for _anything_ , please let me know. Here’s my card.” She scribbled her mobile number down on the back before handing it to John. “You know, I re-read your blog this afternoon. Seems to be that Sherlock Holmes doesn’t leave the flat for anything other than a good puzzle.”

“Or his brother,” replied John. Again, all true.

“Mmm-hmm. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m meeting someone! Enjoy your dinner, Dr. Watson!” She left, looking head-over-heels in love with life. 

As John made his way to the restaurant, set in the mansion’s ornate banqueting suite, John sadly realised that he _had_ made a date for Sherlock and himself, one that was looking more and more like it wasn’t going to happen. Up until then, he hadn’t realised how much he had been looking forward to sharing his company over a meal; somehow, a good steak and a fine glass of wine seemed unimportant without a certain someone to share it with. 

Knowing Sherlock, he’d either address the awkward foot incident immediately in a frank, straightforward fashion, take a passive-aggressive approach, or ignore the whole scenario as if it hadn’t happened. John would prefer to just talk about it and get it over with, but he figured that was unlikely to happen. 

He was shown to a relatively private and quiet table near the windows that overlooked the gardens; the sky had grown overcast. John studied the decor - dark, oak-panelled walls, Victorian oil paintings, heavy gilt mirrors, wall sconces with lit candles- and tried to imagine a time when this was the formal dining room of only one family and its honoured guests. The room had been converted into a dining area that housed no more than thirty tables, so the atmosphere remained intimate. 

John was going to allow himself ten minutes to sulk and wait for Sherlock, and then he was going to order dinner and enjoy it, company or no. He picked a bit at the fine linen of the tablecloth and absently wondered what types of flowers were in the small vase next to the tabletop candle when Sherlock did finally join him. He’d obviously been outside - cheeks pink and hair wind-tossed. John thought he looked lovely and even younger, somehow. Sherlock had a way of doing that - mysteriously appearing anywhere from twenty to forty, his actual age hovering somewhere between the two.

“Really spectacular gardens,” Sherlock announced, unbuttoning his suit jacket and sitting. “Seven separate bee species alone on the tea roses.” 

So, ignoring it then. Might as well.

“You’ve changed your clothes,” Sherlock observed.

“Dinner.”

“That’s your best shirt.”

John affected his best Sherlock impression. “Obviously,” he scoffed. “Really, Sherlock, you are positively scintillating this evening.”

Sherlock smiled fondly. “Your mimicry skills are improving,” he said. “One day we may even be able to improve your acting”

John dropped the ruse. “Fat chance. I’ll leave that to you.”

The waiter appeared with the bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon John had ordered. John didn’t bother to taste it, but looked to Sherlock, who approved the vintage with a nod. He hadn’t expected Sherlock to want a glass, but he accepted. When the waiter reappeared, John ordered the steak he’d been craving and was surprised when Sherlock--who hadn’t glanced at the menu--asked for monkfish. 

John shot him a quizzical look when the waiter retreated. He opened his mouth to speak but was cut off. 

“The special was clearly written on the board next to the maitre d’s station. You were so intent on your own desire for steak -- which you have mentioned no fewer than three times -- that you ignored the board and the waiter’s explanation of the evening’s specials completely.”

“That’s not what I was going to say.”

“It wasn’t?” The little line appeared between Sherlock’s brows. John decided that one day, he would kiss it. Hopefully sooner than later.

“No. I _did_ see the specials and I _was_ listening. The monkfish is wrapped in Parma ham. Sherlock, you’re _eating_.”

“I’m not eating; I simply ordered.”

“You don’t order unless you’re going to eat. We’re on a case,” said John quietly, “and you ate this morning.”

Sherlock shrugged, plucked at his napkin, and took a swallow of wine. “I suppose I did.”

John shook his head. Whatever. 

“I think we may be receiving company for dinner. While I was walking, my dearest brother phoned. He seems to find it necessary that we meet the owner. It seems they’re rather chummy. Something to do with horses, apparently.”

John remembered the painting from the main reception area. Mr. Phillip Leybourne, weak chin. He really couldn’t picture Mycroft in jodphurs. Or having friends. As far as John could tell, Mycroft wore bespoke tailoring at all times and had associates, business partners, enemies, and Sherlock.

“Does he have any idea about what might be going on at the spa?”

“Mycroft didn’t let on, but it might be an opportunity to acquire some useful background.” Sherlock took another sip of wine and stared out of the windows for a while. 

They ate their hors d’oeuvres companionably, Sherlock discussing the history of the building along with describing interesting features of the grounds before explaining his current assessment of Lillian.

“She’s driven, certainly. And very clever. She has impeccable taste and I wouldn’t be surprised if she were well-versed in feng shui. She knows what will make her clients feel at ease and how to cater to the wealthy.”

“Any overt signs of deviousness?”

“Not that I can tell. If she’s doing something untoward, she’s covered all her bases. She was not the least bit nervous that we would discover anything out of the norm.”

“Overly-confident?”

“Perhaps.”

“So what is she doing behind closed doors? Giving bad massages?”

Something dark passed across Sherlock’s eyes. “Don’t be an idiot, John. She’s proud. I’m betting she is extremely skilled at her art. Maybe you can get her to stroke your feet as well.”

Oh shit. Here it came.

“Sherlock, I...”

Sherlock leaned closer to John over the table and whispered with all the venom he usually reserved for people he truly loathed, “Think she could induce you to orgasm by that alone?”

“Jesus, Sherlock. That’s completely inappropriate...”

“Would she be ‘brilliant’?” He spit out the last word. “Or is that reserved for _James_? You throw a fit because I collect a few random, discarded hairs and tell me your body is ‘personal’ and I can’t just take things because they belong to you and you let some man, some _stranger_ , touch your feet, your feet of all places, John, and you get an _erection_ and call him _brilliant_!”

John put his fork on the table and stared Sherlock down. John had stared down bigger and much more dangerous men, and when John was angry, he was righteously angry. A charging rhino would have stood down to an offended John Watson. At the moment, he was absolutely, incandescently furious. His eyes bore into Sherlock’s with the heat of the Afghan desert at high noon. 

Eventually, Sherlock broke the stare and slumped back a bit in his chair, defeated. 

John allowed himself a few breaths as he counted backward from ten. Murdering Sherlock was not on the weekend’s agenda. 

“Sherlock Holmes,” he said once he could trust himself to speak again. “Jealousy does not become you.” 

It was at that moment that their main courses arrived. The waiter sensed the tension at the table, deposited their plates, and quickly made himself scarce. John picked up his knife and pointed it at Sherlock. “If you want to apologise, then _be civil and eat_ ,” he commanded. 

Sherlock swallowed and picked up his knife and fork.

_____________________________________________

 

John was going to attempt conversation again when the unmistakable whiff of damp Labrador mixed with one too many gin-and-tonics heralded the imminent approach (on somewhat short legs) of a member of the landed gentry.

“Are you Holmes and Watson? Welcome to the WC. Name’s Leybourne,’ he boomed, pumping John’s hand while peering speculatively at Sherlock as if trying to work out which of the two looked most likely to be related to Mycroft. “Sorry to interrupt your tête-à-tête -- do carry on eating,” he said, pulling up a chair from another table and miming “G&T” at their waiter. John didn’t think the man -- with his shock of white hair, ragged nails and dubious personal hygiene -- looked anything like either a spa user or a spa owner, even an apologetic one, but he didn’t care. The steak really was exemplary and he wanted to savour it without having to deal with a pouty Sherlock, who had, miraculously, managed to eat a few morsels of fish.

Sherlock’s pout was instantly replaced with his false charm. “Not at all,” he replied. “My partner and I were just saying how impressed we are with the operation you’re running here. And please do give my complements to the chef. The fish is... _brilliant_.”

John ignored the barb. _Partner_. Sherlock had never introduced him as his _partner_. Colleague, doctor, occasionally friend, but partner? Never. Even if they were a couple (‘You _are_ a couple’, Lestrade’s voice came floating back to him) John wasn’t sure if ‘partner’ is even what they’d call each other. He was so taken aback that he forgot about being angry and stopped following what Sherlock was saying until Sherlock said, “Isn’t that right, John?”

“Yes! Of course.” He hoped it was something agreeable. One never knew with Sherlock. 

“By all means,” said Leybourne, sitting down to join them and smiling broadly, revealing a mouthful of slightly discoloured teeth. “I simply had to meet Holmes minor. Mycroft’s full of splendid tales.”

“All kind words, I suppose,” ventured Sherlock, going back to his dinner. At this rate, John thought, he may actually finish it. 

“Indeed,” replied Mr. Leybourne, gesturing towards Sherlock with his half-empty gin glass. “He says you do consulting work and are a detective of sorts. I must admit, I do so enjoy a good bit of sleuthing! I’ve got all the Agatha Christies.”

“First editions, I’m sure,” said Sherlock, looking absolutely fascinated. John wanted to laugh. Sherlock _despised_ Agatha Christie. He chewed his steak instead.

“Without a doubt. I find Hercule Poirot a bit tedious, but Miss Marple is a woman after my own heart.”

“Oh, mine, too.” Sherlock agreed warmly, and John found himself snorting into his wine glass. 

“And you, Dr. Watson. Mycroft tells me you write about Sherlock’s adventures on an internet diary thingummyjig.” 

“A blog, yes.”

He leaned in and John did his best to hide his distaste. He had a fairly decent poker face and he employed it now as Leybourne invaded his personal space. “You wouldn’t, say, be interested in writing a little something about your weekend with us, would you?”

“I would be delighted to,” John replied as earnestly as he could, if anything just to get Leybourne to back up, which he did. “You really have an amazing place here. Sherlock was just telling me about the gardens, but the spa is really something. We met Lillian today and she was gracious enough to give us a tour.”

“Oh, Lillian. Great girl, Lillian. Done so much for us.”

“James mentioned she’d studied in China.”

Sherlock shot John a questioning look, which John mentally answered with _if you had stayed, you git, you would have known, too_.

“Yes. That was one thing about her that really stood out. After my divorce from Annabel, I’m afraid to admit, the old WC fell on some hard times. Relaxation and beauty treatments were more her kind of thing than mine. I needed someone to give the place a good kick up the backside.’

“Lillian?” John asked. Sherlock had resumed eating, although he was now picking, brain engaged again on the case. 

“She had the whole caboodle. She was exactly what we were looking for.”

“We?” asked Sherlock.

“Yes. Myself, of course, my son, Robert...the catering manager, the hospitality director, and, er...several of the therapy people.”

 _None of whom you know well enough to name,_ observed Sherlock to John as he leaned over on the pretext of reaching for the pepper grinder.

“There’s nothing that girl can’t do. She even helped do the decorating. Made a dent in the finances at the time but within two years, we had not only paid for the renovations, but were turning a considerable profit. Her ‘Fountain of Youth’ is extremely popular. I owe her tremendously.”

“Have you ever had ‘The Fountain of Youth’ treatment yourself, Mr. Leybourne?” asked John. 

“Oh, please, call me Phillip. No! I never go in there. It’s all a bit....well, I don’t really like all that touching stuff and sitting about in towels. For you younger men, yes. But by Jove, Lillian knows what she’s doing. Not long after she arrived Sing Sing got spooked by a rabbit and I went arse over tit into a ditch. Flat on my back for two weeks, then along comes Lillian and her Chinese magic and it’s all better. She has a healing touch.”

“Do you plan on stepping back a bit in the future?” asked Sherlock. “Operating this place must keep you on your toes.” 

“It does indeed. But my son, Robert, unfortunately has shown very little interest in taking over. He decided to study chemistry instead and works for Pfizer, developing pills and potions. Staying here was simply not exciting enough for him, I suppose. I would hate to see this place leave our family.” He nodded to John, “Don’t put it in your report, but perhaps I’ll have to sell.” He shook his head. “What a shame that would be.” He looked maudlin for a moment, then knocked back the rest of his drink. “Well, boys, I’m off. Got to check on a poorly filly before I turn in. Please do take advantage of everything we have to offer. If there’s ever a mystery at Willow Cross, I’ll know who to call.”

He departed, leaving John and Sherlock to stare at each other across the table. John had finished his meal; Sherlock clearly had eaten what he was going to. 

“He has no suspicions,” said Sherlock, steepling his hands together under his nose and savouring the considerably fresher air. “He is also a colossal idiot about anything with less than four legs.”

“Is that why he’s friends with Mycroft?”

Sherlock shook his head. “Mycroft has no friends. He has _allies_. So, Lillian studied in China?” he asked, changing the subject.

“Yeah. And rumour has it that she has a boyfriend, too.”

“Hm. I think it’s time to do a bit of research on Ms. Lillian Gleason.”

“Agreed.” 

The waiter reappeared and cleared their plates. John removed his napkin from his lap and set it on the table.

Sherlock fidgeted for a moment. “John, you are getting dessert, are you not? I...I like creme bruleé.”

John searched Sherlock’s eyes. Who would have ever thought Sherlock could feel jealous. Poor, jealous bastard. Besotted. They were both besotted. The knowledge was thrilling, euphoric, even. This situation needed to be remedied. _The case_ John told himself. _The case comes first._ It’s what Sherlock always said; it was the way their relationship would always be, and John was kidding himself if he thought Sherlock would ever put him first, even if they were ten years’ married. He’d waited this long - what was a few more days? And when the case was solved, John would make his move.

“Me too,” he said. John put the napkin back on his lap and smiled softly. _You’re forgiven._

Outside, rain began to fall.

____________________________________________

The rest of the meal was pleasant enough, and John and Sherlock stayed down in the dining hall for another hour or so, finishing the bottle of wine, deducing Leybourne (“Mother indifferent, father inadequate: still hankering after nanny,” said Sherlock disdainfully, as if that explained it all), and carefully avoiding any mention of feet. John found it strange that Sherlock was so bothered by the whole debacle in the spa; John had never before considered feet to be particularly intimate or erotic, but judging from his reaction, Sherlock clearly did. Then again, John had not anticipated getting hard at the thought of Sherlock massaging his feet, or that Sherlock would be jealous. It was all useful information.

By the time they returned to the honeymoon suite (“After you,” Sherlock had said melodramatically as he held the door open for John), it was dark. John lit a fire in the hearth as Sherlock made himself comfortable in a chair with his laptop. 

“I’m asking Mycroft to run a background check on Lillian,” he intoned as he typed, not looking up from the screen. “See what you can find about reflexology, especially anything nonstandard that might be practised in China.” Soon, the detective was lost to research, eyes scanning web page after web page. 

John was reading an article about special teas brewed for relaxation when he received an e-mail from Lestrade: 

**Shit day. Still at the office. Molly said you two dropped in earlier this week. Turns out “Mr. Considerate Lover,” as Molly put it for some reason that I do not want to know, is actually a Brian Holleran. Pathology reports have come in. Drugs found in his system. Girlfriend contacted us about his disappearance - turns out he might have had a gambling problem. Something seems off. You two interested?**

John pecked out a response:

**Currently on a case masquerading as a holiday. Umbrella has been meddling. Should return soon. Send me path report. Forwarding to Sherlock.**

He hit the “send” button and heard Sherlock’s phone and computer bleep simultaneously, but Sherlock gave no indication that he had even noticed.

John read until his eyes were bleary -- everything from acupuncture to Zen meditation -- and when he realised that Sherlock was likely going to be up all night doing whatever he was doing, John took his clothes to the bathroom, brushed his teeth, and changed into pyjamas. He had wanted to sleep naked, but with Sherlock’s earlier behaviour and the case preoccupying his mind, he thought better of it. Maybe tomorrow night. Battle plan, Watson. Case first, Sherlock second.

He plugged his laptop in to charge and turned off the bedside lamp. Sherlock was still sitting by the fire, illuminated by the glow of the computer screen and the soft flicker of the flames. John climbed into that glorious bed, burrowing himself down under layers of satiny-smooth sheets and soft duvets. He’d likely kick them all off later, but for now, it was perfect. He rubbed his bare feet together, noticing how soft they felt. He felt full and warm and exhausted. Yawning, John said goodnight to Sherlock and to one of the most bizarre days he’d had in a very, very long time. 

_____________________________________________________

John was awakened by the feeling of proximity. It was not an uncomfortable feeling, but one that he noticed, even while asleep. He dragged himself out of a pleasant but unmemorable dream, up through the cobwebs of slumber, and opened his eyes. 

He was lying on his side, and there, not three feet from him, was Sherlock, who had pulled up a chair and was crouched in it, arms wrapped across his knees, staring.

“What are you doing?” John mumbled, not bothering to move.

“Waking you up.”

“By staring at me?”

Sherlock shrugged. “It worked.”

“How long have you been there?”

“Fourteen and a half minutes.”

“It’s highly unlikely I woke up from your stare alone. I must have heard you.” John closed his eyes again.

“Don’t go back to sleep, John.”

“What time is it?”

“3 o’clock in the morning.”

“What could you possibly need from me at 3am?” Then, sitting up, “Did you solve the case?”

“No.” Sherlock’s eyes danced. John could see the excitement in his face, even if the room was lit only by a small lamp at the far side of the room. “How would you like to do a bit of exploring?”

The familiar zing of adrenaline erased all vestiges of sleep. 

“I need to have a look at Lillian’s office, and I think you, John, really should find out what’s inside ‘The Fountain of Youth.’”

John smiled. Sneaking around a spa at night. Now _there_ was a proper date with Sherlock.

 

_______________________________________

 

Skulking around Willow Cross in the middle of the night was right up Sherlock’s alley; the man had no compunctions whatsoever. John, on the other hand, was experiencing a familiar mixture of emotions: excitement and the thrill of danger or getting caught, tempered with an ingrained sense of morality. Sherlock had half-convinced him that breaking laws for the sake of justice was morally acceptable (Cancels it right out, John) but John still felt slightly _wrong_ about breaking and entering, and something about being wrong with Sherlock felt decidedly right. It was a conflicted and wonderful feeling, and John savoured every moment of it, every time.

John had insisted in putting on jeans and a jumper because if he was going to get arrested, he sure as hell wasn’t going to be handcuffed wearing pyjamas. Once properly dressed, he and Sherlock sneaked out of the honeymoon suite, down darkened hallways, and through the doors that led to the spa entrance. Keeping in fashion of the rest of Willow Cross, the doors were actually secured with an old-fashioned lock, which Sherlock picked easily while rain leaked through the trellised climbing roses and dripped on John’s head. 

“I’m going to find Lillian’s office,” Sherlock whispered once they were in. “Is your phone on?”

John nodded. 

 

“I”ll text you.” And then, Sherlock was off, leaving John standing in the dark. He fumbled in his jacket for a miniature torch, and waited until his eyes adjusted enough to find his way to the large pool area before turning it on.

The spa at night had other-worldly feel. During the day the pool area was flooded with light from rows of windows and skylights; those windows were now dark and rain-streaked. The place was aglow from the lights from the large swimming pool, which sparkled like a sapphire in the middle of the huge room. The wall sconces remained lit, but all overhead lighting was extinguished. Shadows dwelt in every corner. No quiet talking or relaxing music broke the quiet of place; the lions had ceased their endless spitting. All was silent except the soft lapping of water. 

John unnecessarily held his breath as he moved toward the VIP rooms, and soon he found himself at the very end of the corridor, face-to-face with the door marked “The Fountain of Youth” written in fancy calligraphy. He took a deep breath, said a little prayer that it wasn’t locked, and turned the knob.

John heard the trickle of water before he saw anything - the place was as dark as a tomb. He shone his torch from wall to wall, seeing a bit of greenery there, a cupboard there, but couldn’t make out much from the small beam of light. He stepped into the room, shut the door quietly behind him, and fumbled for a light switch, flicking it on. 

If the other VIP rooms were impressive, this one was jaw-dropping. John wasn’t sure if he had left the spa for a moment and was magically transported to some exotic jungle retreat. The room had been completely transformed from what had, at some point, been some kind of greenhouse. The glass ceiling was still there, although it was mostly hidden by a vine that grew up and over and was covered with fairy lights, a few hanging lanterns and a riot of purple bougainvillea. There was tropical greenery everywhere, especially around what seemed to be the bathing area, which was entirely paved with limestone. There was a massage table at one end, and what looked like a small bed canopied with white gauze at the other. 

So _this_ was Lillian’s realm. John could picture her working in here, her fit arms and agile hands working the knots out of everyone’s lives. 

John let himself take it all in for a moment, then winked the fairy lights back off. The glass was mostly obscured by greenery, but the light of the torch would be less obvious if someone happened to be looking down from a guest room.

“Well, Lillian,” he whispered to himself, “let’s see what you’re doing in here.”

John started with a full examination of the cupboards, which yielded nothing but

noseful after noseful of perfumed lotions and oils. Add aromatherapy to Lillian’s list of credentials. Other findings included tea-making supplies, fresh linens, large canisters of both salt and sugar (for scrub), a drawer full of paintbrushes (for mud?), a basket containing large, round stones (for massage), and a small refrigerator that housed nothing but bottled water and milk (for tea). John searched for a good hour and found nothing out of the ordinary, other than several wooden instruments that must be used for massage but looked more like medieval torture devices - or sex toys. 

He was on his way out, just taking one last long look the room when he noticed something out of the ordinary. _Observe,_ Sherlock was always saying. _You see, but you don’t observe._

Something about the way the linen was lying over the massage table struck him as odd, as if there were a slight protrusion on one side. He went over, lifted up the sheet, and found a little drawer built into the side of the table. Sliding it out, he expected to find more oils, or towels, or other implements of relaxation - instead, there were rows of boxes. Small boxes. Lifting one out, John shone his light across the label, which was printed in both English and Chinese: sterile acupuncture needles. 

Bingo. 

John pocketed a box and went to find Sherlock.

_________________________________________

John was nearly out of the corridor leading to the VIP rooms when he heard it - faint, rhythmic splashing. He made his way cautiously into the swimming pool area, eyes scanning quickly. Someone was in the pool, swimming lengths.

He looked down. On the nearest lounge chair, a pile of dark clothes were folded meticulously on a lounge chair, a suit jacket slung over the back, shoes lined up neatly on the floor - Sherlock, then. What the hell?

Unmoving, John stayed in his position, half-hidden by the roses that flanked the VIP entrance, and watched. Sherlock swam an effortless crawl for another five minutes, back and forth across the pool without stopping, before hoisting himself up over the far side.

He was gloriously naked. 

John swallowed audibly.

Sherlock rolled his arms a few times, stretching out his shoulders. John was a good distance away, but he could still see the blue light gleaming off the water than ran down Sherlock’s back. Sherlock ran his hands over his hair a few times, unsticking it from where it was plastered to his scalp (it was much longer when wet, John noticed) and then walked forward to the “leisure lagoon” where he stepped in, sank down, and disappeared.

The acupuncture needles in John’s pocket were all but forgotten. 

Sherlock had left his clothes _right there,_ knowing that John would see them. His phone would be with his clothes - the only way John could communicate with him would be to go and find him - likely Sherlock’s intention. Well, Sherlock had said he liked to swim. 

John summoned his Watson resolve and walked past the large pool and back to the dark recesses of the warm, steamy area which currently housed a very naked Sherlock Holmes.

Sherlock was sitting, on an underwater bench, apparently, with his head tipped back and eyes closed. 

“Are you getting in, John?” he asked the ceiling.

“Um.”

“How many opportunities are you going to have to enjoy this place without having to share it with less entertaining and substantially poorer-looking company?”

John chuckled. What the hell, indeed. He stripped off his clothes, kicked them under a lounge chair, and stepped in, thanking all that was holy that the water was opaque with whatever mineral concoction Lillian treated it with. He sat opposite Sherlock, who was still leaning back with his eyes closed. His neck went on _forever_.

“Did you find anything?” John asked, finally. He was naked in a hot tub with Sherlock. Surreal.

“I can’t _think_ , John.” Sherlock said at last. “Swimming helps clear my mind.” 

“Oh.”

“I’ll never solve this case if I cannot think, and I cannot think because of you. You’re driving me mad.”

John’s eyebrows came together. What?

“You asked me earlier this week if I were having a personal crisis. I’m afraid that the answer is yes.”

John’s guts twisted. 

Oh. God.

This was it, the moment neither of them had wanted to deal with, the moment that had presented itself so many times before, that they had ignored. He guessed it was kind of hard to ignore these things if you were wet and naked and high on the possibility of getting caught. 

“In the car, on the way here, you said that you don’t know anything about me. I told you that was patently untrue. You speak the language of feelings. I speak the language of knowledge, John. I know things; it is my job to know things. I can only tell you what I know.” He finally opened his eyes and looked at John, who found it very hard to maintain the eye contact under Sherlock’s intense gaze. 

“I knew you from the day I met you. Now I know you have fewer nightmares, that your leg no longer troubles you except when you’re overly tired; I know you like blackberry jam best, but not the kind with the seeds; I know you choose to read mystery novels when I’m not around because you fear I will tease you.” 

John’s heart began to pound. Sherlock continued, his voice picking up speed.

“I know you rub your feet together when you sit in your chair and before you fall asleep; I know you have at least fourteen different shades of hair on your head; I know your smiles and all the lines of your face; I know how many times you lick your lips a day.” He paused, swallowed, and continued. “I know when you are truly angry with me; I know when I’ve hurt you. I know you hate it when I don’t eat; I know you worry about my health. I know you care for me very deeply. I know I have acted foolishly, and I know I have avoided this.”

Sherlock slipped from his seat and waded across the pool on his knees until he was directly in front of John, who no longer felt quite in control of his body.

“I know you’re the best friend I have and always will have.” He licked his lips and stared at the water for a moment. “I know your heart, John, and I know your mind.” Sherlock drew a shaky breath. “I think...I think I would very much like... to know your body.”

Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. If John didn’t take that moment, that beautiful moment where Sherlock had bared his skin and his soul, he knew he was never going to get another one. His heart in his throat, John took Sherlock’s head in his wet hands, pulled him close, and kissed him.

________________________________________________

John had had his share of awkward first kisses, as well as those that just seemed to come together flawlessly. He’d never kissed a man before, much less a naked one, a wet, naked, gorgeous, brilliant one. At the moment, however, his brain had discarded every other kiss in favour of this strange and wonderful moment. 

He was vaguely aware of the pounding of his heart and the proximity of Sherlock’s body to his, and if they slid any closer together, certain bits and pieces would be touching. For the most part, though, John’s entire universe shrank down to the feeling of Sherlock’s full lips, of his own hands guiding Sherlock’s face, fingers sliding over wet hair, eyebrows, the nape of his neck. He couldn’t keep his eyes open, so he let them slide shut. 

The kiss was tentative at first, their lips brushing, again and again, John not wanting to be too eager and scare Sherlock off -- he had absolutely no clue about the man’s prior sexual history except for his one-time mention of past ‘lovers’ -- but it wasn’t long before Sherlock’s hands came up from the water to slide John forward, bringing them closer together. Without thinking, John spread his legs to let Sherlock kneel between them.

The first contact of his erection against the smooth skin of Sherlock’s abdomen was nearly too much to bear. John deepened the kiss, meeting Sherlock’s tongue, hot and wet. He heard himself groan, a needy, plaintive sound. Sherlock pulled back a bit, gazed at John with hooded eyes, whispered, “More,” and eagerly went about getting what he wanted.

How long they spent like that -- pressed together in the warm water, lips capturing and recapturing one another, tongues tasting, exploring, tangling, an intimate dance, breaking apart for air only to come back together again -- John would never know. It could have been five minutes or an hour, but when it ended, their breath ragged and their hands roaming over backs and collarbones and biceps, John leaned his forehead against Sherlock’s and laughed gently. His lips were swollen and his balls ached, and he had never been happier. 

“Do you know, Sherlock,” he said, smiling, “what you do when you don’t speak someone’s language?”

Sherlock made some noise deep in his chest. 

“You use your hands.” 

Sherlock laughed and settled a large hand over John’s chest, below his scar and over his heart. The look in his eyes was so full of emotion that John was having a difficult time processing it. He’d mourned men he’d loved after they bled to death in his arms with military stoicism. Now, his eyes were stinging from happiness. He might just break down right there, sobbing, and found that he really didn’t care. Fulfilment, after so long...

They sat there like that, grinning stupidly at one another, before Sherlock removed his hand from John’s chest, placing it on the side of his face. “You need to shave,” he said lightheartedly as John leaned into the touch.

“So do you,” John replied, mirroring the gesture. “Stubble was...new. I really didn’t think you got any.”

“I told you I could grow a beard. It grows very slowly. And it’s rather ginger,” he added shyly, dropping his hand from John’s face. “I find it horribly ironic that, after all this time, we first kiss when I haven’t recently shaved.”

John gave him a perplexed look. 

“I’m ambivalent about facial hair, John, but I thought...” he looked shy all of a sudden, and swam back in the pool a bit so that they weren’t touching anymore. “...I thought you would find it off-putting. And I was hoping...that one day... one day you might kiss me and I didn’t want you to...feel so different...with a man and...so I shaved every morning, every single morning...just in case.” Sherlock trailed off, looked down, and ran his hands over the surface of the water.

John walked out on his knees a bit to meet him. “Sherlock, are you telling me that this whole hair business - you really thought I’d be repulsed by - oh, God, the _waxing_...” 

_Considerate lover._

Oh.

Oh, Sherlock.

Sherlock looked at the water. John had never seen him embarrassed. He clearly was now. “I’m a man, John,” he whispered. “I have the body of a man.”

 _Corpus Hominis_. Body of man.

John crept forward until they faced each other, kneeling. Their cocks met in the middle. John shivered at the contact and smoothed his hands over the bald patch on Sherlock’s chest before his fingertips traced what was left of the fine hair there, then down, down, through the water, under Sherlock’s arms and around his back and over his arse before pulling him tight. Their height difference was less obvious while they were kneeling, and John was able to mostly meet him eye-to-eye.

The parts of them that made them men touched, cocks trapped flush between slick bellies.

“You _are_ a man,” John whispered back. “And _I_ am a man. And this man’s body finds your man’s body incredibly attractive.” He leaned in to claim a kiss. “Every part. Your nose...” another kiss, “...your hands...” another kiss, “...your legs...” another kiss, “... and especially your hair, and everywhere it grows. _Everywhere._ ”

Sherlock shuddered. “Oh, fuck,” he breathed.

“Yes,” said John. “Yes.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Phillip Leybourne's dialogue and character came directly from the brain of my beta and Britpicker friend, BettySwallocks, who saved that section from certain doom. If you can hear his character, thank her, because she wrote it.


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which proceedings are interrupted, assistance is required, and difficult questions are asked.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again to BettySwallocks, whose help and encouragement have made this what it is. Infinite thanks.

John had managed to suppress most rational thoughts for a good deal of time. It wasn’t initially difficult -- it’s hard to think of much at all when the object of your sexual fantasies has his tongue in your mouth -- but during one breathing break John’s brain switched back online to this particular thought: I am kissing Sherlock Holmes, and the world is still going around. It was only then that he opened his eyes and found he had to refocus them. 

At some point during their extended snogging session (Sherlock was currently going to town on John’s earlobe and neck), they had ended up on the bench at the far side of the warm pool, and John saw now that indeed the earth had been revolving; the dark of night was giving way. It wasn’t light by far, but the skylights, which had been completely lost in the gloom of the vaulted ceilings, were now just visible. 

The spell was broken.

“Sherlock,” he whispered, hating to stop their current activities but realising the inevitable if they didn’t. “Sherlock, it’s getting light.”

“Don’t care,” murmured Sherlock against the side of his neck, licking and nibbling.

“No, really, Sherlock, stop.” John mustered all of his strength and pulled Sherlock’s face back so he could see his eyes. “As much as I am enjoying myself, we’ve got to get out. It’s going to be morning soon, I’m so keyed up that I’m about to add my DNA to this pool, and I’m sure there’s Epsom salts in this water, so if you keep at my neck like that, you’re likely to get a miserable case of diarrhea.” 

Sherlock blinked his eyes few times. “That would be decidedly unromantic,” he said at last, licking his swollen lips. 

“Look. We’ll get dressed and go back to the suite. I’ve got something to show you from Lillian’s room, anyhow. She’s made a fucking _tropical grotto_ in there.” He laced his fingers through Sherlock’s, brought his hand up, kissed his fingers. “Case, remember?”

“Not going to work, John.”

“What?”

“I’m not thinking about the case.”

John smiled and extricated himself from a lapful of lanky detective. He been hard for God-knows-how-long now and was actually a bit uncomfortable. “Oh, yeah? Do I dare ask what you are thinking about?” He was nearly out of the pool when he felt Sherlock embrace him from behind. 

“Orgasm.” 

John froze, steam coming off his body in the cool air. 

Sherlock’s prick was nestled right above his arse, and John could feel Sherlock’s large hands were roaming down his sides and over his hipbones, getting closer and closer to where he wanted them the most (had they really spent all that time without actually touching the goods with their hands?) and he was almost ready to turn his brain back off when something caught his attention -- a faint light flicking on at the opposite end of the pool area, where the reception area and offices were. 

He froze. “Sherlock, down,” he whispered. “There’s someone here.” Heart pounding with a mixture of unadulterated lust and cautious fear, John sank back down into the water as quietly as he could, the two of them creeping to the edge of the darkest corner. Earlier, John couldn’t see Sherlock in the pool from the front, and unless whoever had come in got close, he or she wouldn’t either. John said a prayer that whoever it was didn’t venture into the pool area or go near the VIP rooms where one bespoke suit complete with socks and shoes still rested on a lounge chair - its presence would pique anyone’s curiosity. 

It was hard to hear anything over the soft lapping of water this far away from the front, but soon they saw a man pass the entrance to the pool, going towards the offices. It was hard to get any sense of his appearance from their spot hunkered down in the water, but it was clear that the man was carrying something -- a case or basket of some sort. He disappeared for a few minutes, then returned without the container, switched off the lights, and departed. 

“Oh, I _hate_ that man,” said Sherlock, once he was certain they were alone. “This is most inconvenient.” 

For a moment John thought Sherlock was talking about him, about them, about the fact that the transport had overruled the mind, until Sherlock turned to him and offered him a soft smile. “Promise me you won’t have some kind of sexual identity crisis between now and when I get you in my bed, John.”

“Did that about six months ago.”

“Good. I think.” He frowned momentarily. “Right. Let’s get dressed. Judging by the light, it’s nearly morning. And while I fully appreciate your current state, I don’t believe you are too keen on being caught with an erection twice in twenty-four hours. It really is a spectacular member,” he continued, climbing out of the pool, his own cock still standing proudly. “I simply cannot wait to get my hands - or my mouth - on it.” He gave John a wink and walked, confident and dripping wet, toward his clothing.

John groaned and wondered how he was going to stuff himself back into his trousers without coming. 

____________________________________________

By the time they made it back to their room - John with a slightly wonky gait - it was nearly 5am, and Sherlock seemed to be back on the case. John had insisted on showers, even though he was a bit waterlogged; the salt would dry uncomfortably and the next time he tasted Sherlock’s skin, he wanted it less seasoned. 

Sherlock looked disappointed at John’s insistence they shower separately. 

“If we both get in there,” John had said, “we’ll stay in so long our skin will fall off.”

John struggled through his own shower, washing with cold water as quickly as he could. His cock, while not fully erect any more, hung plumply and in want of attention between his legs. He avoided it and scrubbed the salt from his body in record time before shaving thoroughly. 

Testing his clean jaw with his fingers, John contemplated Sherlock’s earlier confession. How many times had he seen Sherlock emerge from the bathroom, clean-shaven to a fault. How many times had he studied the angle of his jaw, curvature of his lips, jut of his adam’s apple, the tiny moles gracing that smooth, pale skin, shaved clear of hair just for him, just in case. The thought was endearing but also rather sad. How much time they had wasted...

John checked his appearance in the mirror after combing his hair. His own lips were still red and puffy and he was pretty sure Sherlock had bitten him on the neck a bit too hard in places. “Like a bloody teenager,” he muttered to himself, but as he hung his towel on the rack and reached for a fluffy white towelling robe, he found it impossible to keep a soppy smile off his face.

He emerged from the bathroom to find Sherlock hunched over his computer. “Looks like we should call Lestrade,” he said as John dressed. 

“Let him wake up a bit first, yeah? It’s still early.” John tugged on jeans, a shirt, and a lightweight jumper and went about making the bed. He hated an unmade bed - a residual habit of military life. After, slapping a silly decorative pillow back in its proper location, John turned around to find Sherlock stripping off his suit - again. He smiled seductively as he undid the buttons of his shirt, causing John’s face to heat. “Oh, no you don’t,” he said firmly, pushing Sherlock through the bathroom door. “Shower. Coffee. Eat. Case.”

Finding his jacket, John pulled out the box of acupuncture needles, went to sit at the table in the big bay window, and spilled out its contents of ten blister packs of twenty needles each. These needles were small, nearly two inches long. Each was tipped in red (color-coded for gauge thickness, he’d read earlier) and encased in a plastic tube. John was familiar with needles, but he had never examined acupuncture needles before. Curious, he opened one and tested its sharpness with the tip of his index finger. He frowned, thinking, before getting his computer. A quick search on YouTube yielded hundreds of acupuncture demonstrations. 

Clearly, Sherlock wasn’t coming out of the bathroom any time soon, so John logged on to Barts’ medical databases and searched for acupuncture complications, finding very few conclusive cases in the UK but a few instances of death by pneumothorax or secondary infection in patients who had been treated abroad. He wanted to try the needles on himself but thought better of it.

Eventually, John heard the shower shut off, water from the tap running, and then the sound of a hairdryer ( _Do you know how long it takes to dry naturally?_ Sherlock had asked one time after John teased him about his grooming routine). Finally, Sherlock emerged with a towel wrapped around his waist, looking pink-cheeked and fully awake. He whipped the towel on the bed, pulled black pants from where he’d stashed them in the chest of drawers (he always unpacked and put everything in its place, whereas John’s things never left the duffel), and shimmied into them. John tried not to watch lest his body, which _finally_ stood at ease, resumed full military alert.

Sherlock dressed with precision as John began to explain what he found in Lillian’s “Fountain of Youth” room. He shook the box of needles as Sherlock buttoned his cuffs. “She’s got loads of these,” he said. “What on earth is she doing practising acupuncture?”

“She did study in China.”

“You have to have years of training to be a certified acupuncturist. You think she’s up to no good?”

“No. She’s proud. I would be highly surprised if she were performing medically unsound acupuncture.”

“Then why hide it? That’s a great skill to have - it should have been on her CV. Leybourne said nothing about it.”

Sherlock rolled on his socks and tied his shoelaces; John tried not to think about feet. “That is the question,” he said.

“What did you find in her office?”

“Nothing.”

“Nothing?”

“I couldn’t get in. Locked. Needs a key card.”

John put on his own shoes and socks. He was dying for for a coffee.

“So that whole time I was sneaking around you were...swimming?”

“Thinking, I told you. I’m finding it very difficult to concentrate on two stimulating things simultaneously. I’ll learn how. I’ll have to do a little renovation work.” He made a hand gesture near his skull to indicate _Mind Palace_. 

“Can you think about the case now?”

“Oh, yes,” said Sherlock, gathering his wallet and phone. “While I find masturbation tedious and generally unsatisfying, I simply had to find sexual release, and since you were so insistent on showering alone - and in the cold, John, _seriously_ \- I enjoyed, as you would say, ‘a nice wank’.” 

John gaped. So much for keeping his body under control. 

“Would have been much better with you there. No worries. It has been many years since I have been sexually active, so a little priming of the pump might be in order. Wouldn’t want to disappoint.”

“Since when do you use euphemisms?” John sputtered.

Sherlock scrunched his eyebrows together. “I think you may have broken my brain,” he said with mock-seriousness. 

“You can’t just _say_ things like that.”

“Why? Because it arouses you? That’s the point.”

“I don’t need any help, thank you very much.”

“No, you don’t. But it amuses me to watch your face. Come, John. I shall solve this case in my regular brilliant fashion and then we shall come back here and make a mess of this ludicrous bed.” And with that, he was out the door. 

John really hadn’t ever seriously thought about what a relationship with a sexual Sherlock would be like. He never really thought it would happen. He had never thought Sherlock would embrace sex. They really hadn’t even done much but a bit of kissing and naked squirming about in the pool, and already Sherlock was masturbating in the shower? Holy fucking hell. Scenario after scenario spun out from his mind in different directions, of them actually having sex and Sherlock hating every minute of it, or of it not working, of Sherlock being repulsed by acts of the body, of Sherlock cringing at John’s confessions of love, of Sherlock divulging some intolerable sex kink, of Sherlock deciding it were all just an experiment, of Sherlock becoming some horrible needy, clingy thing... 

John stood in the doorway on the verge of a panic attack, his earlier confidence momentarily misplaced. Oxygen, Watson. Breathe.

His eyes had just fluttered closed as he breathed in through his nose, out through his mouth, and then Sherlock was back, his hands coming up to frame his face.

“Shhh, John. Everything is fine. Stop thinking.”

John took a hiccuping little breath and steadied himself. 

“Let me do the thinking. You... just feel.” Sherlock pressed a kiss to John’s forehead. 

They stood in the doorway for a moment, John trying to get a grip, trying to find the usual balance he had with Sherlock, the brotherly camaraderie, the familiar presence. His heart searched, hoping that what they had wasn’t irrevocably lost. 

But there it was; it hadn’t gone after all. He was still John. Sherlock was still Sherlock. The Earth was still orbiting the sun and everything would be OK.

Let it go, John.

So he did.

“So, what exactly were you saying about that bed?” he asked as seductively as he could. Sherlock had touched himself in the shower while thinking about him. Good Lord.

He could feel Sherlock smile against his forehead. He’d been granted so many of them this weekend, Sherlock’s smiles. They were more precious than any of those strange, wonderful gifts he’d received. If Sherlock were smiling, really smiling, then everything _was_ fine. 

“Mycroft’s e-mailed me,” Sherlock said at length. “He’s got the report on Lillian. Let’s get some coffee and read through it, all right?”

John nodded. Sherlock nodded back, looking hopeful, before taking off down the hall again. John glanced at his watch. It was only 7am. He hoped to be back in that bed in fewer than 12 hours.

_________________________________________________

“So she _is_ an acupuncturist,” said John. He’d given up trying to read the tiny font on Sherlock’s phone.

“She’s a very highly-trained acupuncturist,” corrected Sherlock. “She has a BSc from the Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, and she’s licensed with the British Acupuncture Council. She spent five years in China between 2003-2008. She holds certificates in reflexology as well, but those are significantly shorter courses of study. Clean criminal record.” 

“It just doesn’t make sense. She should have those diplomas on the wall, or have started her own practice instead of staying here. Even so, she manages the spa. Couldn’t she just offer acupuncture as one of the packages? Something’s going on behind those closed doors she doesn’t want publicised.”

“We also have that fellow who interrupted very important business earlier.”

John felt the tips of his ears go a bit pink. “That utter bastard,” he said, sipping his latte.

“I’ll bet whatever he was carrying was deposited in Lillian’s office. Hateful digital locks.” Sherlock screwed up his face with disgust, then emptied three packets of sugar into his double espresso. “He had a key and felt comfortable turning on the lights. So he’s no stranger to this place.” 

“I would have loved to get a look around in there. The fact that she locks it after hours, whereas the rest of the place is unsecured, can mean only one thing.”

“She’s got something in there she doesn’t want anyone to see.”

John stared out of the windows from his seat in the library, where Willow Cross served coffee, tea and a continental breakfast buffet. He still felt a bit full from last evening’s meal, and after the emotional roller coaster of a night, he was quite content with a strong coffee and a croissant instead of the more substantial fare served in the dining room. The rain had blown away and the day looked like it was going to shape up nicely. 

Caffeine buzzed merrily in his veins, chasing away the vestiges of his earlier panic attack. Maybe he could get a walk in later, get out into the fresh air and just exist for a while. 

“How are we going to get in there, John?”

“I don’t think we’re going to. Unless...” John pulled out his wallet and procured a card. “We phone a friend.” 

________________________________________________

Navya was more than eager to meet them before her shift started.

“This is a bad idea, John,” Sherlock chastised as they waited for her at a metal table set up in one of the gardens. “I don’t need anyone’s help.”

“Well, clearly, we do. Unless you just plan on barging in on one of Lillian’s sessions, and even then, performing acupuncture isn’t illegal. Whatever she’s doing turns her clients into Mrs. Jenkins. What did Mycroft say? That he felt ‘euphoric’? From what I read, acupuncture doesn’t usually have that effect.”

“What we really need is for her to perform it on one of us.”

“Can’t you just go in there, whisper something in her ear, and coerce her with your charm?”

Sherlock made a noise of distaste. “It wouldn’t work on her.”

“Then, right now, Navya is our best option. She knows, anyway, Sherlock. Smart lady.”

As if on cue, Navya entered the garden. Her hair was pulled up in a French pleat, her name tag already affixed to the front of her tailored blouse. 

“Good morning!” she said, dark eyes twinkling as she shook their hands and joined them. “I trust you two are enjoying yourselves?”

John watched Sherlock deduce her, and relaxed a bit when he must have deemed her trustworthy. 

“Does your mother know you were at the Sugarmill last night?” he asked.

“Ooooh. I was hoping you’d do that.”

“Her mother?” asked John. “She’s a grown woman, Sherlock.”

Sherlock ignored him. “I know. You were expecting it.”

“And no. I told her I was going to the movies with friends.”

“Have you two...?” John inquired, just to make sure.

Sherlock gave John a long-suffering look, took a breath, and launched in. “She lives with her aging mother, an immigrant from India, who came to England too late in life to learn the language well, nor did she need to, because she worked behind the scenes in the family’s...hmm, food? Catering? Yes. A wedding business. Supervising the kitchen, yes?”

Navya nodded slowly, eyes never leaving Sherlock’s face, hypnotised by his brilliance.

John was equally mesmerised, but in his case, by pure lust. _Seduction by deduction,_ he thought to himself, moving his legs slightly further apart, for comfort.

Sherlock, as usual, was wise to get off in the shower. John found himself getting hard - again - at an alarming rate. What the fuck was happening to him? He’d always had a healthy libido, but he was not a young man any more, and had learned to control his body years ago. He laughed to himself. He’d performed emergency tracheotomy surgery under enemy fire, neutralised a serial killer through two windows, and could even assemble a bloody IKEA bookcase in under an hour. But it seems he could no longer listen to Sherlock read someone’s life from her jacket buttons, a coffee stain, and the shape of an earring without getting a stiffy.

The problem was that he couldn’t stop imagining what it was going to feel like, when all Sherlock’s attention was focused on them, on their joint pleasure, deducing his every desire and then delivering. And soon, too, back in that ‘ludicrous bed’ with those soft, satiny sheets. Jesus fucking Christ. Crime scenes would never be the same again. 

_For goodness’ sake, Watson. Find something else to think about. That mummified corpse of a cat you and Sherlock found in a wardrobe last year. Yup. That will do._

Seemingly oblivious to John’s plight, Sherlock droned on, “...until her husband passed away. Must be one of many children; left home for university in London but was forced to return when another sibling could no longer care for her mother. Overqualified for the job she’s currently doing but earns enough to provide for both herself and her mother, but the house is falling to bits, and she is worried about the future. Feels great responsibility because she is not only the oldest but the only daughter. Enjoys cooking and, even though she thinks she may be a bit too old for it, going to concerts with her girlfriends. 

“You had to work fairly early this morning, however, so you didn’t stray too far: last night you went to the Sugarmill.” Sherlock narrowed his eyes a bit. “With a man of which your mother would not approve.”

Navya’s eyes widened with wonderment. “Electro club night,” she said. “ _Wow._ ”

Sherlock looked impressed with himself, smug as usual.

“How can I possibly assist you?” It wasn’t a polite question -- she was genuinely wondering.

The mummified cat had done its work, chasing John’s rampant libido back into the wardrobe of his mind. “We need access to some locked areas,” he said cautiously. “A key card of some type.”

“That’s it?” replied Navya. ‘We don’t have many areas that are locked with that system. Dry storage, the wine cellar, and the managers’ offices... oh. May I ask whose office you would like to see?”

John looked at Sherlock for permission, who nodded in the affirmative.

“Lillian’s.”

Navya did some sort of polite snort. “Don’t tell me Golden Girl has done something wrong.”

“Not that we know of, but...”

“Why ‘Golden Girl’?” asked Sherlock, interrupting and leaning in.

“Oops. Sorry. I didn’t mean to sound spiteful. Lillian really is very kind. And she has done so much for this place. It’s just that she’s kind of a celebrity around here. Everyone seems to do whatever favours she asks, and Mr. Leybourne basically handed the spa over to her. If Lillian wants something, she gets it.”

“Has she ever asked you for favours?” 

One look confirmed that she, indeed, had. “Lillian is a good person,” Navya insisted. “But she’s very ambitious. She cast her hook in deep waters and has enjoyed reeling in the big fish.”

“The boyfriend?” queried Sherlock.

“His name is Bobby, Sherlock. I’ll let you figure out the rest.” She dug in her handbag a moment and pulled out a plastic key card. “Just promise me I’m not going to get fired,” she said as she placed it in Sherlock’s upturned palm.

“I’ll insist you get a pay rise,” he said sincerely as he pocketed it. “Now, if _I_ could possibly ask you for a favour...”

_________________________________________________

The day turned out to be exceptionally beautiful, John thought, as he and Sherlock walked around the gardens of the massive estate. He wondered how many full-time gardeners the place employed to keep the grounds in such pristine condition. The lawns were wide and brilliantly green, the gardens lush and abundant. There were even worn paths that took a wanderer through the wooded portions of the grounds, just enough to evoke a true sense of privacy.

It was on one of these paths now that they were walking, killing time before Sherlock was treated to a shortened version of “The Fountain of Youth.” How Navya managed it remained a mystery, but Lillian had agreed to do the package sans bath and rest time, eliminating two hours from the original version. John wasn’t keen on Sherlock being the test subject, but he had insisted and John simply couldn’t convince him otherwise. Until then, they’d enjoy a stroll.

“You said on the way here that you know nothing about me,” Sherlock said as they walked along. “And after last night you have questions.” 

“I suppose.”

“You should ask your questions,” he replied. “I haven’t kept anything from you, John. I just...lack certain graces of conversation.”

John chuckled. “That’s very true.”

“Nothing about my life seems worthy of casual discussion to me, but if there is anything you desire to know, all you have to do is ask. The most I could do is decline to answer.”

That seemed very sad to John, who was thinking that, for as much as he felt toward Sherlock, there was so much about him that was void, left unshared, or, worse yet, deleted. 

“Casual questions or serious questions?”

“You may ask me anything. It would be easier for me like this.”

They came to a stone bench, where Sherlock sat and waited for John to do the same.

“What was your favourite ice cream flavour? As a child?” John asked at last.

Sherlock scrunched his eyebrows and scowled. “I give you an opportunity to ask me anything and you choose to ask about my taste in dessert?”

“Answer the question.”

“Strawberry,” he admitted begrudgingly.

John kicked at some pine needles with the toe of his shoe. Here went nothing.

“When did you start using?”

“At university.”

“Why?”

Sherlock shrugged. “Bored. Couldn’t separate my mind from the transport. Later, John. It is an unpleasant topic.”

“Did you share needles?”

“No.”

“Are you a virgin?”

“No.”

“Are you gay?”

“If you insist on labelling my sexuality, I suppose that may be the proper term.”

“Have you had unprotected sex?”

“Yes.”

“Have you been tested?”

“Of course, John,” Sherlock sighed, frowning. Perhaps he didn’t want to play this game after all, but John was going to take what he could get.

“Have you ever been in a relationship before?”

“One like ours? No.”

 _Ours._ John’s heart skipped a few beats.

“How long have you...felt this way? About me. Uh, us.”

“For a long time.”

They were quiet for a while. The wind blew gently, making leaves on the trees whisper to each other. 

John swallowed. Might as well ask the tough ones. “Am I an experiment?”

“No.”

“Will you tire of me once you have me figured out?”

“No.”

“Do you really want to have sex with me?” He asked this one quickly. Maybe he had dreamed it all. This was Sherlock, after all, Sherlock who usually claimed sex was unnecessary.

Sherlock smiled at this, drawing out the word, “Obviously” as his reply.

John only had one more question for the time being, but it was a critical one:

“Will you lie to me, Sherlock?”

Sherlock leaned forward and rested his head in his hands for a moment before looking up. Their eyes met for the first time during this difficult conversation. “If I have to,” he said. “But not without great reservation. I will never lie to you about my feelings for you, but if I must choose between saving you or myself, I will put you first, and if that means I have to lie to your face to you to protect you, so be it.”

John didn’t know what to do with that, so he looked back down at the ground and nodded. “I understand,” he murmured. He would never lie to Sherlock. He couldn’t, even if it meant life or death. Lying was not in his nature, and he considered it the gravest of transgressions. But he understood. He would kill for Sherlock. He already had, without a second thought.

The wind continued to blow. A flock of geese flew overhead, heading toward the pond they’d walked by earlier. Birds sang and squirrels scurried and John’s heart pounded with new knowledge. He stood, ready to head back, when Sherlock grabbed his hand and pulled him back down.

“My turn,” he said.

“You mean there’s something you honestly don’t know?” John asked softly, trying to lighten the mood. 

“I only have one, John.”

“Well, ask away. I owe you after that.”

Sherlock attempted a few times before he managed to get it out. “Do you love me?” he said finally.

John was fairly sure his heart had either just ripped in two or swelled to bursting. Something knotted inside his chest, clenched in his guts, roiled through his blood, sent heat to his groin. 

“Oh, Sherlock,” he said, finding those strange, grey-green eyes and holding them. “With every fibre of my being.”

“I’ve been told I’m not an easy man to love.”

John gave him a sad smile. “You’re not. But that doesn’t mean I don’t feel it.”

“Why?”

Another flock of geese flew overhead, their V formation breaking up. “Geese don’t choose a leader,” John said at last. “One bird takes the lead, and then when it tires, another one takes its place. There’s no communication. The lead bird doesn’t send a text to the rest of the flock saying, ‘Take over, mate, I’m knackered.’ The birds just _know_. Maybe they see it, deduce it, I don’t know. But somehow, they feel it and make the change. I don’t know why I feel what I feel, Sherlock. God knows you can be a selfish, insufferable prat. You’re moody and tactless. You can be cold and occasionally cruel. But you’re brilliant and you make me laugh and you’ve brought me back from a sad, empty life. I just _know_. I know I love you. I know I want you. Isn’t that a good enough answer?”

“Kiss me, John,” said Sherlock.

And John did, right there on the bench, with enough passion to make even a goose blush.


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which John is brilliant, Sherlock makes a confession, and someone has been meddling, but it's all good.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, infinite thanks to BettySwallocks. She's spent more time helping me on this than she probably should.

Sherlock insisted he wasn’t hungry, but John ordered lunch anyway, knowing that Sherlock would help himself to titbits from his plate.

“What are you going to do if she comes at you with loads of needles?” John asked around a mouthful of salade Niçoise, “What if she does a Vulcan nerve pinch on you that renders you unable to move?”

“A what?”

“Never mind.”

“I don’t know,” said Sherlock pensively, popping a cherry tomato into his mouth. “I imagine I’ll just have to wait and see.”

“Just be careful.”

“John, it’s not like she’s harvesting organs. And acupuncture is supposedly painless. The needles are so fine, one should barely feel them pierce the skin. I can handle it. Relax.” They both looked at each other, looked around at their weekend retreat, and smiled. _Relax_. Yeah, right.

John finished eating and texted Navya, who was going to arrange a distraction for Melissa that would allow John to, hopefully, slip into Lillian’s office unseen. Appointments changed on the hour, so by ten past, all the therapists would be engaged elsewhere, and Navya swore that she could get Melissa hooked on an internet chat about her date.

The two of them walked to the spa together and John smiled nervously as Lillian greeted them and fussed about how Sherlock sadly wasn’t going to get the full experience. She looked so pretty and fresh-faced; it was hard to imagine her as anything other than a complete professional. Lillian insisted that John hold Sherlock’s suit jacket and his phone.

“I just can’t allow mobiles back there,” she said. “I don’t want people even thinking about their outside lives while I’m working with them. Completely counterproductive.”

Sherlock surrendered his phone to John with reluctance. “Who knows, John,” he said, “maybe I’ll find transcendence and emerge a different man.” _Don’t worry_.

“You emerge exactly as you went in,” John said in a slightly threatening manner. _Don’t do anything stupid._

And with that, Sherlock was off, following Lillian into the pool area and out of sight. 

John took a seat, grabbed a magazine he had no intention of reading, and waited. Soon, he heard it - the tiny ping of an incoming message - and waited for Melissa to turn to her computer. The reception area was mostly empty at this point, except for a few customers who were browsing through beauty products or waiting for the salon. After a few minutes watching Melissa’s face, John stood up and made for the office corridor as if he belonged there.

No-one noticed.

Taking the key card from his pocket, he waved it in front of the little electronic box, heard the mechanism engage, and let himself in, shutting the door quietly behind him.

_____________________________________

Like her private grotto, Lillian’s office was perfectly tailored to her tastes, an eclectic blend of Western modern and Eastern exotic. John noticed right away the absence of diplomas on the wall; most professionals framed and hung theirs. 

A cursory search through Lillian’s desk showed nothing out of the ordinary, and John knew he couldn’t hack into her computer, so he didn’t even attempt it. Instead he tried to find the container he’d seen earlier. In the poor lighting, he’d barely seen it, but when he opened Lillian’s small personal refrigerator, there was no mistaking what the vessel had been: a small coolbox.

Inside were were nine 5ml vials. _Insulin_ , he thought immediately, until he reached in and picked one up to find it completely unlabelled. He pocketed the tiny glass tube, feeling confident he’d found what he was looking for, walked out of her office to find Melissa still engaged with her computer, and sat back down.

Less than a minute later, he heard both his and Sherlock’s phones chime simultaneously- a text from Lestrade. He’d just sent the autopsy report via e-mail.

That should pass the time nicely. 

“I’m going to head back for a kip while Sherlock’s in there,” John told Melissa, who looked a bit guilty, “in case he’s looking for me after.”

“Oh, sorry, yeah, I was going to suggest you try the hydrotherapy bath or something while you wait.”

“Not a problem. Just let him know.”

“Sure thing,” she said as John made his escape. 

_________________________________________

John returned to the room, grabbed his computer, and brought it down to the library where he could think easier. Staring at that gigantic bed would _not_ help. Once situated, John opened the files on the laptop and began reading Molly’s report of the post-mortem and the deceased’s pathology results. Molly’s conclusion: cause of death -- serotonin syndrome.

Well, that was certainly odd. Serotonin syndrome was not a common cause of death; it was a poisoning, essentially, caused by an excess of the neurotransmitter usually as a result of an overdose of antidepressants or recreational drugs such as methamphetamine or cocaine. He’d never seen it himself. Strange.

He was the only one in the library, so he rang Lestrade.

“Hairless guy,” he said, “you mentioned gambling?”

“Brian Holleran. Girlfriend did. They’ve got a long-distance thing going on; she’s in Edinburgh during the week, see each other at weekends.. Noticed he’d been missing payments on things, bills piling up, letters from debt collection agencies.”

“Did you get his credit card statements?”

“Yeah. Was sussing those all out last night. Turns out he’s been spending a ton of cash at - you’re not going to believe this - Willow Cross. You know, the health farm.”

Shit. Jesus fucking shit.

“Lestrade, I think you’d better get a team together. I don’t think our Brian died of an accidental overdose. Remember when I said we were on holiday? We’re at fucking Willow Cross _right now_. Something suspicious is definitely happening down in the spa; get anything you can on Lillian Gleason. I found something in her office,” he continued, holding the phone in the crook of his neck as he took out the tiny test tube. “Something in a medical vial, unlabelled. Jesus, Lestrade, I think she’s drugging them. How did the drugs get into his system?”

“Molly couldn’t figure it out. He hadn’t ingested them, no traces of it were found in his lungs and he had no puncture marks. She re-did the blood tests several times to make sure she had it right. Bizarre.” 

“I’ve got to go,” he said abruptly, and disconnected the Detective Inspector in typical Sherlock fashion.

Something didn’t _feel_ right to John, and for a man who made major life decisions based on the unexplainable stirrings of heart and gut, ignoring it was not an option. John intuitively _felt_ when Sherlock was in danger; he always had, even from the first day they met. Right now, every mental warning bell he possessed was clamouring away inside his skull. Sherlock had serious weaknesses, whether he liked to admit it or not: he couldn’t back away from a mental challenge, even if it meant serious bodily harm, and depression and addiction were always spectres lying in wait to haunt him, enough to worry Mycroft. John knew that Sherlock could hold his own in a fight, but in scenarios involving his mind he could be incredibly reckless. At the moment, John was quite convinced that Lillian was going to _do_ something to him, inadvertently, perhaps, that would damage Sherlock Holmes more than he was positive she’d done to Mrs. Jenkins.

And John, sometimes to a fault, was fiercely protective of his friends -- and lovers. 

He set his laptop on the chair and stood in the middle of the library, not caring if he looked silly, and closed his eyes, clearing his head the way he did before going into a skirmish or preparing for surgery.

He was no Sherlock Holmes, but John Watson was an intelligent human being who _would_ put the pieces together. He began to mentally categorise all the details of the case so far: 

Lillian Gleason was a highly trained acupuncturist but didn’t broadcast it; she’d created a specialty package that only she provided and that cost an exorbitant amount of money, but clients were more than willing to pay for the euphoric feeling they had after treatment. 

Her efforts had essentially saved Willow Cross from bankruptcy. Leybourne was very pleased with her but wished his son had more interest in the place. He rarely, if ever, sets foot in the spa himself.

Mrs. Jenkins exhibited signs of drug addiction and withdrawal. 

A man who had recently visited Willow Cross died of serotonin poisoning, but the method of drug delivery was ambiguous. 

The man who delivered the mysterious unlabelled drugs had to be familiar with Willow Cross to have a key and to enter the spa so boldly. 

Lillian had a boyfriend named Bobby.

John cycled through the facts, cursing his slightly-higher-than-average mental prowess. If he could only think like Sherlock. Every moment wasted Lillian was getting closer to the man he loved with her pointy little needles...

_Her needles..._

The answer slammed into his mind with such force that he actually gasped: tiny, thin needles / acupuncture / no visible puncture marks / euphoria-ecstasy-MDMA / addiction-withdrawal / Mrs. Jenkins / nine-vials-not-ten / pills-and-potions / robert-bobby / big-fish / ambition / murder / SHERLOCK.

John scrambled out of the library, not even bothering with his open computer, and ran to the reception area, where he startled Navya. “Phone the police,” he said, a bit breathless. “I’m afraid your ‘golden girl’ has been rather naughty. I’ve got to get to Sherlock.”

Navya’s fingers were already dialling by the time John made it out of the exit, through the hall, into the spa, and down the VIP corridor, leaving a trail of confused patrons in his wake. 

He flung open the door to the ‘Fountain of Youth’ to see...

...nothing. 

Lillian was stripping the linen from the bed and Sherlock was nowhere in sight. She jumped nearly a mile at John’s intrusion. 

“Shit!” she exclaimed, followed by, “Sorry, you scared me. Your friend, Mr. Holmes - he - he just flew out of here. You weren’t kidding when you said he couldn’t relax. I’m sorry, I really was going to try my best.” 

“I’m sure you were,” John said darkly. His hand clenched around the vial in his pocket before pulling it out and holding it between his thumb and forefinger. “So,” he continued, “whose idea was it to tip the needles? Robert’s? Or yours?”

The colour drained from Lillian’s face, leaving her as white as the sheet she had clutched to her breast.

 

____________________________________

 

The local police weren’t long in coming, but it would take more than a few minutes to sort out all the details, and Lestrade and his team wouldn’t arrive until morning. John made sure the officer in charge knew the basics and gave him the vial of what John was sure was some sort of medical-grade, super-high strength MDMA. Lillian sat, quietly crying, as John explained. His initial anger was gone, replaced by a mild sort of pity. He honestly didn’t believe she was being purposefully malicious. Ambitious, yes, but she wasn’t a psychopath. She would now be facing manslaughter charges once they officially tied Brian Holleran’s death to the spa, and her other clients would likely press charges. 

Once Lillian was in custody, John left to find Sherlock. Sherlock’s phone was still in his pocket, and so he had no way of communicating with him. John supposed he had returned to the room, and was pleased to see that indeed he had. He was sitting in the chair by the window, shirtless, and staring at something out on the garden. His back was an alarming shade of pink. When he turned to John, he was clearly upset.

John reached him in a few strides, took Sherlock’s face in his hands, and did a quick diagnosis - pupils normal and reacting, skin temperature normal. He reached down and took his pulse - that too, was normal. He found himself feeling tremendously relieved. 

“Hey. Are you OK? Lillian told me...”

“ _Sensitive skin!_ ,” Sherlock interrupted, his face flickering through a range of emotions before settling on anger. 

John examined Sherlock’s inflamed back. “This is an allergic reaction,” he said, puzzled.

Sherlock shot him an irritated look that plainly said _I know, you idiot_.

“Look, Lillian’s been arrested.”

“Good. Look what she did!” he repeated. 

“She said you just...left.”

“You would too if your skin were on fire. It’s _sensitive!_ ” 

“Sherlock, listen. I worked it out. She’s drugging people. With the needles. But she didn’t get a chance to do it with you. Tell me what she did. Everything. We’ve got to get back downstairs; the police are here.”

Sherlock huffed. “I cannot figure out how that was supposed to be _relaxing_. First, she made me remove my clothing and lie down. I found the music selection dull and the constant flow of water would make anyone have to urinate. And then there was _touching_ , John.” He wrinkled his nose at this. 

“That’s the point.”

“I found it distasteful. Her hands on my skin. Repulsive, actually. Vile.” 

“I know you’re not most people, but touch can be very healing. I’ve seen coma patients respond to the touch of a loved one.”

“That’s _the point_!” he nearly shouted, clearly put out that John wasn’t getting the message. John waited and gave Sherlock a look that clearly said _Not telepathic, remember?_.

“I told you before that I do not particularly like to be touched, and you are aware that I have very acute senses. I’ve made my body transport for a reason, John. If I paid too much attention to it I would never get anything accomplished. I know. I’ve made that mistake before. Disconnecting the body from the mind was necessary to the work, and so I mastered my body. However, I know that for most people, you included, attention to bodies is...important. Necessary, even. I...” Sherlock chewed his words for a moment. John let him.

“It’s too connected for me,” he said at last. “Sentiment and touch. It makes me feel.”

“Emotion isn’t pathological, Sherlock. And I’m sure separating your mind from your body is psychologically damaging. As much as you hate to admit it, they’re not separate entities. Your brain is a part of _you,_ the human entire. The brains in vats thing is bollocks.”

“I _know_ that,” Sherlock spat, irritated. “You’re not listening.”

“Then be clearer.”

“She wasn’t you!”

Oh.

John must have looked surprised at the outburst, for Sherlock got himself back under control. He stretched and twisted a bit, obviously uncomfortable from whatever Lillian had put on his back.

“You may touch me, John. I enjoy it. I _want_ you to make me feel. No one else.”

Smiling in spite of himself, John reached out and smoothed Sherlock’s hair, which was in a complete state of disarray. Sherlock leaned into the touch. No wonder he’d been so guarded with his body; Sherlock Holmes was _emotionally responsive to touch_. Who would have thought? He _was_ a human being, after all.

John traced his fingers down over Sherlock’s shoulder and felt his back. It was warm under his fingers.

“What did she put on you?”

“Oil of some kind. It’s got an analgesic in it. Not synthetic, I’m guessing. Heat followed by numbing - likely capsaisin. I can’t feel a thing anymore, now that the burning has stopped.”

John ran a fingernail over Sherlock’s scapula. “Feel that?”

“No.”

“That’s how she did it, then. Inserted the needles without anyone knowing. Got the client very relaxed, massaged them with some kind of numbing emollient, and then inserted the needles. The client, face down and blissed out, would never know. The drugs do their magic as she finishes the treatment. Addiction is a side effect, one that conveniently keeps patients returning. In Brian Holleran’s case, one too many times. He died of serotonin syndrome, basically an overdose of neurotrasmitters.”

John watched Sherlock process. “An empathogen, then.”

“I’m betting something very chemically similar to MDMA but in extremely concentrated form. I’m guessing our late night interloper was Robert Leybourne, Pfizer chemist and Lillian’s secret lover...”

“...and together they formulated a way to keep Willow Cross from going under -- John, you’re brilliant!” Sherlock, his annoyance forgotten, leapt from his chair, spun John around in a childish dance of pure glee, and then kissed him soundly on the mouth. He pulled back, momentarily surprised at himself. 

“I should be brilliant more often,” said John, smiling shyly. He still couldn’t believe this was happening, that he was not only allowed to touch, and even kiss, the person whom he had believed had absolutely no desire for any skin-to-skin contact whatsoever, much less touches of a more intimate nature. John loved kissing, and the novelty of kissing Sherlock might never wear off. 

“Put your clothes back on,” he said after indulging in another brief but enticing lip lock. “We’ve got to get back down there. You sure you’re OK?”

Sherlock put his shirt back on, long fingers deftly buttoning it closed. “Yes.”

“You know, I was really concerned. About the drugs,” John acknowledged. I’m always going to worry.”

Sherlock tamed his hair in the mirror. “I suppose it’s a legitimate concern,” he said, shrugging. “I can’t say I don’t occasionally feel the desire. I’ve locked it away, but sometimes that door slips open. She keeps a key,” he said quietly, almost to himself. “Cocaine.” He said the word almost in a sigh, nearly reverent. It chilled John to the bone. “However,” he continued, “I have significant reasons not to allow myself to return to it. And those are more powerful than chemical enhancement. You asked me earlier what I fear. I fear very little, John. But losing you would be unbearable.”

He said it with such conviction that it wasn’t romantic or overly sentimental, just a simple fact. John was quite sure, as he watched Sherlock finish dressing, that he had never before wanted so badly to take someone to bed. Soon, very soon, he would strip Sherlock of his clothes, turn off his glorious brain, and make him feel everything John was feeling. For someone who said he couldn’t speak the language of emotion, Sherlock was quickly becoming remarkably fluent and John was finding his words rendered useless, stuck in his throat. That’s OK. His tongue could still speak a loving language that did not require the use of his larynx. 

John must have been looking either shellshocked or deep in thought, for Sherlock approached him. “I’m fine, John. Let’s go. I’m in a hurry.” 

“Are we going somewhere?” John looked at his duffel. He had hoped that maybe they’d finish out the weekend at Willow Cross, crime scene or not.

“Going?” Sherlock buttoned his jacket and gave John a look before crossing back over to whisper in his hear, “No. Not going. _Coming._ Hopefully more than once.”

He leaned back, tugged the jacket down, and smiled wickedly. 

“You’re an evil person,” said John, who, once again, was on the way to sporting a hard on. God, how he loved this man.

____________________________________________________________________

 

It was nearing evening when the police finally left with Lillian and Robert Leybourne, who created a great deal of fuss and indignation about the whole matter. Sherlock shut him down in his typical condescending fashion, deducing him publicly in front of his father, who had become a horrified weepy mess, weeping into his G&T about who was going to save Willow Cross, how would he afford the upkeep on the horses, and that all his hopes were lost. John did his best to pacify the poor man and suffered through another hour’s worth of questioning and paperwork before Sherlock announced to the whole lot that his involvement was no longer necessary. 

“John and I have very important business to attend to,” he politely told the local force’s equivalent of Sally Donovan, before extricating John from a very distressed Leybourne Senior, whose portrait would likely be the last weak-chinned Leybourne to grace the main entry. 

_Excuse me, everyone,_ thought John, heart beginning to pound. _I am now going to finally have sex with Sherlock Holmes. As in, right now. In a few moments. As long as it takes for me to get from here to there. Please God, let me get there._

As he followed Sherlock, who was walking with purpose, back to the room, he suffered a momentary crisis of performance anxiety. He felt like a teenager, a young, inexperienced thing who was going to go off at the first touch. 

“I wouldn’t care if you did,” said Sherlock, stopping in front of the door.

“Reading my mind again?” asked John. Was he really nervous? Maybe a little. Excited, for sure. Randy as hell? Yes.

“Shall I carry you over the threshold?”

“I’d like to see you try,” huffed John.

“It’s supposed to be symbolic. This whole ‘honeymoon suite’ business. A couple enters into a new relationship and then consummates it behind closed doors.”

“It’s not a ‘new relationship’, Sherlock. It’s just, um, added a new dynamic?”

Sherlock thought about this for a moment. “No carrying, then?”

“No.” John opened the door. “Together?”

“Together.”

______________________________________________________

 

Sherlock turned the key and the sound seemed to resonate within John, announcing the end of one phase in his life and the beginning of the next. And while he didn’t generally like confinement, the locking of the door also seemed like a promise, the promise of having Sherlock to himself, without interruption from the outside world. It was a gift of sorts. He was thinking for a minute until one of those decorative pillows hit him in the chest. Sherlock was flinging them about the room with gusto.

“So pointless,” he was saying. “And ugly. These are not going back on this bed. Neither is this,” he said, tugging at the enormous damask duvet. Too hot. Too bloody...fluffy. But these sheets” - he ran his hands over them after wresting the giant duvet to the ground - “these sheets will do quite nicely. For tonight, at least.” 

John stood, holding the pillow in front of him in and grinning. 

“Sex should be had in a proper bed,” continued Sherlock. “At least for the first time.”

“What, no back alleyways? Lestrade’s office after hours? On the stairs of 221B after chasing after criminals half the night and we’re a sweaty mess?”

Sherlock was divesting himself of his shirt. John had watched Sherlock undress more this weekend than he ever had in several years of living with the man. It would never get old, he decided. Sherlock paused now, and looked up. “John?”

John chucked the pillow, not caring where it landed and approached his new lover. He had to reach up a bit to help pull the shirt from Sherlock’s shoulders, and when one was uncovered, he kissed the skin below his collarbone. “Do you know how many times I just wanted to, just reach out and...”

Sherlock’s eyes had gone a bit wide as John’s hands skirted lower, pulling at a belt. “And what?”

“Take what I wanted.”

“Why didn’t you?”

“Why didn’t _you_?” he retorted. “Fear of rejection, I suppose. Afraid of fucking it all up.”

Sherlock made a noise of agreement as John finally pulled the belt free and went to work on the buttons of his trousers. “You are much braver than I am, John.”

“I don’t feel brave. In fact, I’m really fucking nervous.” John laughed a bit. He held up his hands as proof - they were trembling, slightly. “Take those off,” he said to Sherlock, a smile in his voice, “because there’s no way I’m going to get your shoes untied in this state.”

Sherlock sat on the bed and undid his shoes, pulled off his socks, and then, with his usual nonchalance, pulled down his trousers and pants, which he actually left on the floor, probably for the first time in his entire life. He flopped onto the bed and then stretched himself out in all his naked and aroused glory like da Vinci’s _Vitruvian Man _. “Mmm,” he sighed. “Clothes, John. Off. Join me in this silly bed and we shall make love until we are exhausted and famished.”__

__John stripped faster than he ever had in his life. It sounded like an incredibly good plan, and if he stood around too long, he might start thinking, and he wanted to do what Sherlock had earlier suggested and just feel._ _

__Trying not to feel self-conscious, he slipped in beside Sherlock, who rolled onto his side and propped himself up on his elbow so they were face-to-face._ _

__“Is...there anything I should, uh, do? Not do?” John asked, smoothing his fingers down Sherlock’s arm, watching a trail of goosebumps rise in their wake. Responsive, indeed._ _

__Sherlock kissed him, drawing their bodies together flush. “Just do what feels right,” he whispered, eyes slitted, lips still against John’s. “You’ll know, John. You always know. You’re remarkably intuitive. Trust yourself. And I will watch you, and I will know what pleases you.”_ _

__“I’m surprised you don’t know it all already. Deduced it.”_ _

__“Oh, some.” Sherlock shifted a bit and John didn’t even have to think about settling into a gentle rhythm of rocking hips. It was completely natural._ _

__“Like what?” John breathed. He could feel Sherlock, hot and hard, against his own stomach; their cocks brushing together as they moved._ _

__“You will like anything involving my mouth. You watch it, you know,” he said between slow, tongued kisses. “You’ll find it arousing if I use vulgar or explicit language. For instance, if I say things like, ‘I want your cock between my lips’, or, ‘by the time this weekend is over I will have tasted all the secret places of your body,’ you will get hard if you’re not or grow closer to orgasm if you are. Both of those sentiments are true, by the way.”_ _

__“Jesus, Sherlock.” If John’s hips moved a bit faster, he couldn’t help it. The friction was too exquisite. He moved one arm under Sherlock’s head and flung the other over his side, drawing him even closer._ _

__“Mmm. But I’d rather not deduce you in bed, John, unless you ask me to. Which you might.”_ _

__There were distinct advantages to Sherlock’s ability to read everything about him. The intimacy was a little frightening, but John realized that Sherlock would be able to give when John needed giving, and take when John needed taking, and he wouldn’t have to fumble through months of awkward sex as he figured everything out - what went where and who did what to whom. Their sexual relationship, John concluded as he continued to pump his hips, would be not unlike their friendship or their working relationship. Sometimes, they were like a puzzle, fitting together; where one lacked, the other supplemented. But other times, they were perfectly synchronous, when they instinctively knew what the other would do. Helpful when fighting criminals, John thought, or having spectacular sex._ _

__“Sherlock, I’m...” John’s heart was in this throat and his balls positively _ached_ , already drawn up tight against his body. “...I’m not sure talking like that is all that wise at the moment.”_ _

__“I want to know you, John, as a man knows a man.”_ _

__John did groan then, loudly, pushing his cock against the skin of Sherlock’s stomach. “Just touch me,” he said, beyond caring if he sounded desperate. “Please. Just get me off. It’s been too long, oh God, all fucking day, Sherlock, I’ve needed this, and later we can...”_ _

__He didn’t get to finish the thought, for Sherlock reached between them and separated their pelvises just enough to wrap a large hand around both of them, something John hadn’t even conceived of. John wanted to watch, wanted to look down at their cocks joined in Sherlock’s hand, but he couldn’t; he was too far gone. Memories of the night before, a small eternity ago, came flooding back, of Sherlock on his lap, slippery skin against skin. _There’s so much I want to do_ , he thought, _and I want to see it all,_ but it was fairly useless. His eyes fluttered shut as Sherlock’s tongue slid against his own, both of them panting now between sloppy and sometimes misplaced kisses. _ _

__“Just let it go,” Sherlock breathed against him. “We’ve got all night. We’ve got a lifetime. Come in my hand. Let me feel it.”_ _

__John could feel Sherlock’s hand, strong and steady, as it pulled at them both, the pad of his thumb swiping slippery pre-ejaculate (Whose? Both? God.) over the crown, his movements simultaneously tender and deliberate._ _

__“So long,” continued Sherlock, his voice deep and reassuring and so, so sexy. “I’ve wanted to hold you like this, feel you against me, taste your skin...”_ _

__There it was, the spiralling build somewhere in the pelvic floor, a rush of hormones and adrenaline..._ _

__“...Come, John. I can’t wait any longer either; you have no idea what you do to me... _fuck_...the way I respond to you...what I’m feeling...ohhh...”_ _

__Sherlock lost the ability to speak at the same time John’s orgasm could no longer contain itself, and he came, stiffening as he cried out, arching his hips as the spasms of ejaculation slammed through his body._ _

__He held on as Sherlock, lightening-quick, rolled him onto his back, leaned over him and quickly finished the job, using John’s own semen as a lubricant. John was vaguely aware that his body was still coming, muscles still spasming even though there was nothing left, and managed to slit his eyes open enough to watch Sherlock throw back his head, mouth open and face twisted in orgasmic rapture. Hot wetness splashed over his own cock, stomach, and chest, and then Sherlock’s arm could no longer support him. He flopped down, pinning John to the bed, and his other hand, soaked and dripping, found John’s, twined their fingers together, and held on tight._ _

__They lay like that, heaving and panting, for who knows how long. John eventually had to shove Sherlock a bit - breathing was necessary - but only got a grunt in reply. John had never felt a body much heavier or bigger than his lying on top of him; he found he didn’t mind in the slightest. Except for the need for oxygen._ _

__“Can’t breathe,” he murmured._ _

__“Mm? Oh. Sorry.” Sherlock moved off him a bit, but remained face-down, breathing now into John’s neck. “John, I...”_ _

__“Shh. Was perfect. So perfect.”_ _

__“Yes.”_ _

__John was nearly asleep when Sherlock untangled their wet hands, raised his head, and wiped it a bit on the sheets. “I, um. You’ll want to wash that off?”_ _

__“I’m not squeamish about sex,” John said, wiping his hand on the sheet as well, before claiming Sherlock’s again._ _

__“No?”_ _

__“Why? Do you think I would be? It’s delightfully messy, Sherlock.”_ _

__“Well. Yes.”_ _

__“I don’t care about sweat or hair or come. Any of that.”_ _

__“Oh.”_ _

__“And I’m not moving.”_ _

__“We’ll be glued together if you don’t.”_ _

__“Don’t care. Go get a flannel if you’re that concerned.”_ _

__Sherlock did; John lay there, blissed out and smiling to himself, and was happily surprised when Sherlock took the warm, wet cloth to his belly, wiping him clean, softly, over his softening cock, his testicles, the tender skin where leg met torso. It felt nice. Comforting. Very un-Sherlock. “Thanks,” he murmured when Sherlock was done._ _

__“Never let it be said that I am not a considerate lover.”_ _

__John could hear the smile in his voice. “Oh no, not that again,” he laughed sleepily. “I’m not, um, usually that quick,” he added, feeling the need to justify himself._ _

__“Don’t apologise. That was...fantastic.” Sherlock must have really meant it; he suddenly looked a bit shy. John found it incredibly endearing._ _

__“C’mere.”_ _

__Sherlock joined him back in the bed, pulling the satiny sheet over them both and wrapping himself around his lover._ _

__“I’m completely shattered,” John yawned._ _

__“Sleep, John.”_ _

__Sherlock may have said something else, but if he did, John didn’t catch it. Warm, comfortable, and completely sated, he promptly fell asleep for the first time within the strong circle of a man’s arms._ _

_____________________________________________ _

__John would have slept right through dinner and all night long had he not been awakened by a tickle of on his nose. He opened his eyes to find that somehow during sleep he’d ended up with his face buried in Sherlock’s armpit._ _

__Laughing inwardly - never woken up to _that_ before - he spent a moment engaging his olfactory sense, trying to catalogue Sherlock’s scent. Sherlock was far from ripe (John actually had smelt him at his worst, covered in rubbish, muck from the Thames, animal blood, chemicals, the sour smell of sweat produced under extreme stress) but he still smelled masculine under his arms, a mix of expensive deodorant, soap, skin, sweat, musk, and sex. He’d never found the scent of men arousing, but was now overcome with curiosity about how Sherlock would smell in other places, how his scent varied from area to area as it did on a woman. John was tempted to stick out his tongue and taste that smooth, pale skin right under that fine, dark hair, and he nearly did so when he felt Sherlock inhale more deeply and stretch. He probably would have got an elbow in the eye if he had, anyway._ _

__It was at that moment that John’s stomach decided to make itself known, growling loudly. John propped himself up on his arm to look at Sherlock, who had actually fallen asleep, one arm tucked behind his head, the other resting on his stomach._ _

__“Really, John,” he murmured, eyes still closed. “And here I thought I had satisfied you.”_ _

__John traced a finger down Sherlock’s chest, over the spot he’d waxed, circling a nipple. “Need to keep my energy up,” he said, before flopping back down, tucking his own arms behind his head. “We’ll order room service.” It was still light out; they must not have slept that long._ _

__“Do I have to get dressed?”_ _

__“No. You can eat completely starkers, if you want.”_ _

__Sherlock laughed, a deep, sleepy sound. John sat up, stretched, and went to use the toilet. When he came back, Sherlock was lying sideways across the bed, the sheet tangled over his legs and just covering his arse. “I don’t suppose you’d allow me the luxury of a cigarette?” he asked._ _

__“Sherlock, we’re at a _health farm_. And no. Not if you want my mouth on yours again anytime soon.”_ _

__“Pity.”_ _

__“You’ll have a harder time hiding it now. I’ll taste it.”_ _

__Sherlock rolled over, hung his head off the bed, and stared at John upside down. He had an odd expression on his face, and then John realized, too, that this new element of their relationship was going to return with them back to Baker Street, perhaps indefinitely. Maybe the honeymoon suite was more appropriate than he originally had thought._ _

__“You would withhold yourself from me? I never pegged you as the type to use sex as a tool of manipulation.”_ _

__“Oh, you just wait until you’re belittling people at the next crime scene. I will use my powers of seduction just to infuriate you.”_ _

__Sherlock smiled, rolling over again, pulling the sheet around him and sitting up. He looked like some debauched, post-bacchanal toga-clad Roman: lips swollen, eyes shining, hair in complete disarray. All he needed was a laurel crown. “If you do that,” he replied while John found his pants and put them back on, “I shall turn you into a quivering pile of want in front of the whole Yard. They will all see just how much you enjoy my tongue in your mouth.”_ _

__John found the Willow Cross book that contained the spa services and restaurant menu and threw it on the bed, then threw himself on the bed after it, tackling Sherlock, who couldn’t fight back all wrapped up._ _

__“The look on Anderson’s face would make it worthwhile,” John said, pressing Sherlock into the mattress. He may be shorter, but he was solidly built and strong (not as much as in his military days, before he was invalided, but still, he was far from weak). He took the moment to nuzzle at Sherlock’s neck, which he presented as an offering. Sherlock was finally starting to taste like a human being again, thought John, tonguing his pulse point, instead of soap and salt. It was a good taste, he decided, and resolved to continue down, unwrap Sherlock like a present and perform his first ever blow job._ _

__His stomach had other ideas, however, and protested again, loudly._ _

__“Mm. Better eat, John. Before it’s too late, and you become hypoglycaemic and grouchy all night.”_ _

__Fellatio would have to wait. Truth be told, John was a bit nervous about that, too. He may not have been squeamish - but wondered if he could actually do it with any skill, without gagging or inadvertently biting. Hopefully Sherlock would be forgiving. Couldn’t he just have Sherlock for supper instead?_ _

__“There is that bottle of champagne. And chocolates.”_ _

__“Any Scotch? If I can’t smoke, can we sit and drink good whisky?”_ _

__“Yes,” John said. What an excellent suggestion. He gave one last push of his hips, enjoying the feeling of having aroused Sherlock, again, before rolling off and grabbing the menu. “Order something ridiculous. I want to get a rise out of your brother. Just imagine the look on his face when he sees the bill for this weekend.”_ _

__And then, suddenly, it was so clear. Sherlock bolted up. “That sanguine coward!” he yelled, startling John. “That horsebreaker, that hill of flesh...” He untangled himself from the sheet and began pacing, still naked as a newborn._ _

__“Wait, what? Are we doing Julius Caesar now?”_ _

__“Henry IV part one, John,’ Sherlock corrected, slowing a little._ _

__John raised his eyebrows._ _

“This whole case,” Sherlock extrapolated, waving his arms, “he knew! From the very start. It’s not like he even needed me to work it out. No offence,” he added, waving an arm towards John. Well, that hadn’t changed. “He knew exactly what was going on. He did this _on purpose_! That _meddler_!” 

__John was trying not to laugh, and failing. For all the pain and anxiety they’d been through together, laughter was the perfect antidote, curing all John’s doubts and fears._ _

__“Sherlock, calm down. You’re shouting. And who cares if he did?”_ _

__Running his fingers through his tangled hair, Sherlock appeared to genuinely consider the question._ _

__“Really, you should be thanking him. We’d be back at Baker Street right now. You bored, me watching telly, and both of us wanting something more.”_ _

__John was right, although it obviously pained Sherlock to admit it. After a few more moments of fuming, he realized he was standing naked and half-aroused in the middle of the room. He narrowed his eyes, keen on revenge._ _

__“John, look in that book. Order dinner. Something stupidly pricey. And cake. And then a bottle of Glenfiddich. Nothing after 1976 will suffice. Insist that they go and purchase one if they have to.”_ _

__John pulled himself off the bed and rummaged in his duffel, where he kept an emergency extra-strength nicotine patch or two. He threw one at Sherlock, who caught it nearly without looking._ _

“Oh, you _do_ love me,” he said, surprised. 

__“Yes,” said John. “God help me, I do.” He sat back on the bed, opened the menu and browsed, still smiling to himself. He would remember everything about this impossible weekend for the rest of his life. John didn’t like being indebted, but he couldn’t help but feel that some type of truce needed to be drawn between two brothers._ _

__Oh, Mycroft Holmes. That cheeky bastard._ _


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which there is a proper massage, a consummation, and a vow.

The voice, articulation, language, whispering, shouting aloud,  
Food, drink, pulse, digestion, sweat, sleep, walking, swimming,  
Poise on the hips, leaping, reclining, embracing, arm-curving and tightening,  
The continual changes of the flex of the mouth, and around the eyes,  
The skin, the sunburnt shade, freckles, hair,  
The curious sympathy one feels when feeling with the hand the naked meat of the body,  
The circling rivers the breath, and breathing it in and out,  
The beauty of the waist, and thence of the hips, and thence downward toward the knees,  
The thin red jellies within you or within me, the bones and the marrow in the bones,  
The exquisite realization of health; 

O I say these are not the parts and poems of the body only, but of the soul,  
O I say now these are the soul! 

-Walt Whitman

 

Eleven

 

“And then she said that if I really wanted to live somewhere else, it could be arranged. They were so furious with me that they sent me to stay with my Aunt Jean for a week. I didn’t leave home again until I was officially allowed.” John laughed, remembering.

“All for simply being gone for few hours.”

“She had all the neighbours and the police out looking for me, Sherlock. The poor woman was terrified. She thought I’d been kidnapped.”

“And you were asleep under the hedge the whole time.”

John nodded. “Yeah. All that crying tired me out...”

Sherlock smiled, light from the fire catching on his cheekbones. Night had fallen as they talked over another marvellous dinner, and now they were stuffed on roast lamb with passionfruit jus, potatoes dauphinoise, and lemon and lavender syllabub. Sherlock complained that he would be digesting for a week as John opened the whisky and they both settled in to two chairs by the fire, which, even though it was gas, still threw off enough heat and light to make the place feel homey and comfortable. It was almost as if they were back at Baker Street, except that their chairs were moved a bit closer together, Sherlock was wearing only a robe, and John lounged in pyjama bottoms and a vest. Sherlock had insisted it was John’s turn to tell a childhood anecdote, so John told the saga of his failed attempt to run away from home, a story that occasionally was hauled out at Christmas dinner.

“John Hamish Watson. Sentenced for a week with an intolerable auntie for the crime of refusing to tidy his room.”

“Well, more for scaring them. I was only six.”

“Still.” Sherlock took a sip of his own whisky, savouring it. John had only seen him drink spirits a few times. In general, he avoided alcohol altogether, despite his considerable knowledge of it, complaining that it damaged brain cells and made it difficult to think. Tonight, however, he’d knocked back the first measure before taking his time with the second and now third. “I doubt my parents would have even noticed I was missing,” he said, “but Mycroft would have.”

“Has he always kept such a close eye on you?”

Sherlock gave John a look. “He feels it is his duty to protect me from myself. I suppose, however, he’s relented a bit.”

“Sudden change of heart?”

“No, John. You arrived.”

John felt a swell of pride. Protecting Sherlock from himself was an arduous and often annoying task, but he still remembered when they met, when he had, without even thinking, shot a man who intended Sherlock harm. “You’re an idiot,” he had told Sherlock. John was right in his own deduction that Sherlock risked his life to prove his own intelligence, but, as a man who’d risked his own life to prove his bravery, devotion, and skill, they could be idiots together. 

As much as it often got to him, he _liked_ protecting Sherlock. He may never hold his hand in public or buy him roses, but he could definitely throw - or take - a punch if he needed to. John was also aware of how his presence had mellowed Sherlock. He was still sometimes maddeningly childish and reckless, but his bouts of depression seemed farther apart and less severe than they had when John had first met him, and his arrogance and disregard for others’ feelings, while still there, were held in check a bit better. John was quite convinced that Sherlock would never be altruistic or be capable of casual relationships, but something about the man had.... John wanted to say “changed,” but Sherlock hadn’t changed. He’d just matured a bit. 

“I’m not here to save you. Or change you, for that matter. I made that explicitly clear to your brother the night we met. You are who you are.”

“Nonetheless, I find myself concerned about your reactions what I say or do. For many years I simply could not afford to care about others’ opinions of me. It’s part of being a Holmes, I think. Both my brother and I do not form friendships lightly. If at all. Caring about others is like static. It muddles the mind, obscures truths, blurs boundaries. But, as you have so eloquently stated, emotion, I’m realising, is not a pathology.”

“No, it’s not. Knowledge is power, Sherlock, I’ll not argue against that. But so is love. Ask Helen of Troy.”

“Epic poetry, John?”

“You know what I’m trying to say.” 

“Yes.” 

John set his whisky down. He’d better not have any more, or he would fall asleep and if this were going to be his proverbial wedding night, so to speak, he was going to make sure they both remembered it. “Can I ask you a question and have you answer it honestly?”

“I have already given my word.”

“Can you even love? I mean, are you capable of it? I know you, um, feel something, but...” He trailed off. It was probably a very bad question to ask and he regretted it instantly. Damn the whisky.

Sherlock stared at the fire, thinking, before setting his glass down, too. He stood, deliberately, and then dropped his robe to the ground. John swallowed, watching the firelight play off the angles of his body. He looked like a damn statue. Sherlock knelt then, before him, almost supplicant. “Intensely,” he said without wavering, those strange and beautiful eyes locked on John’s own, before laying his head in John’s lap. John’s hands came up of their own accord, fingers smoothing through dark curls. 

John let out a breath he didn’t know he had been holding. Under the weight of Sherlock’s head, he felt his cock, which hadn’t been completely flaccid all evening, leap a bit. Sherlock must have felt it, too, for he hummed appreciatively. 

“Nothing done by halves, with you.”

“Never.” John could feel Sherlock’s breath, hot, through the soft cotton of his pyjamas.

“Except a massage.” 

Sherlock chuffed a bit and rubbed his head over the now-solid bulge in John’s pants. The movement lifted John from a haze of expensive booze and priceless emotion. “It’s too bad you couldn’t actually get one. That thing with the feet. Wow. You know, I was thinking about you, you great idiot, when I, uh, you know.”

“Oh, yes, I know,” replied Sherlock, who had now taken to mouthing at John through the thin fabric. 

“If I had some oil, I’d give you a massage. Too bad there’s not...” John trailed off as Sherlock lifted his head. 

“John!” he exclaimed, before leaping up (watching Sherlock run around with the beginnings of an erection was never going to get old, John mused) and disappearing into the bathroom. He returned with a familiar brown bottle, which he deposited into John’s hands. 

“You,” said Sherlock. “Only you.”

_______________________________________ 

 

After mentally wrestling with logistics, John decided that the optimum massage delivery position was sitting on the backs of Sherlock’s legs - much more comfortable than trying to lean over him from the side. Clothes were simply going to have to go, so John removed his, manoeuvred Sherlock into position, climbed on top of him, and then had a moment of reflection.

John wondered if it were always going to be like this, that he would have to near pinch himself to see if this were really happening, that he really was here, naked, aroused, pulse hammering away in his veins with Sherlock waiting, prone and vulnerable beneath him. Sherlock’s arms lay limp by his sides, palms up. 

“Has all the feeling come back?” John asked.

“Yes. I imagine the effect is relatively short-lived for most.”

“Tell me if it’s too much,” John said, leaning down to press a kiss between the blades of Sherlock’s shoulders, inadvertently brushing his genitals over the swell of Sherlock’s buttocks as he did so. Very nice.

“Just do it,” Sherlock muttered into the mattress, bossy as usual.

John poured some of the oil into his hands, rubbed them together as he’d seen James do, and then took a few strokes up and down the column of Sherlock’s spine before realizing he was going to need quite a bit more. After properly oiling his hands, he went back at it, exerting gentle pressure with his thumbs as he worked circles over Sherlock’s shoulders and upper back. He kneaded the back of that long neck, hoping that Sherlock wouldn’t mind getting a bit of it in his hair. Down went his hands, over defined muscles of neck, shoulder and back: trapezius, deltoid, latissimus dorsi. 

Remembering what Sherlock had said about his sensitivity, he kept the pressure easy and gentle, hands sweeping over warm skin. The oil glistened in the firelight and its subtle scent blended with Sherlock’s own. John tried to tell himself that it was just a massage, but that was so far from the truth. This was foreplay, and he wanted to make up for his earlier desperation. Sherlock had taken him apart with a few kisses and John had willingly surrendered. Now it was his turn, and he aimed to please.

So far, Sherlock hadn’t protested, so John increased the pressure on the next pass, which caused the detective to groan loudly. “It’s fine,” he said when John stopped. “You can do it harder. If you want.”

John took the hint and began to manipulate muscles in earnest. Sherlock was so _tense_. A few more minutes of pressing the heels of his hands into the taut muscles lining Sherlock’s spinal column did he feel them relax, no longer stiff and knotted, but becoming soft and pliant.

“Oh, John, that’s...rather lovely.”

“Yeah?”

“More.”

John re-oiled his hands, looked at the long torso in front of him, and made an executive decision. He slid back a bit on Sherlock’s legs, so that his balls were tucked up against Sherlock’s calves, and then took that perfect arse in his hands.

Sherlock flinched a bit and squirmed, sighing softly, before relaxing again. John realised that, even though his heart was in his throat, his hands were steady, and he went to work, softly stroking at first, before massaging in earnest, squeezing and pulling and kneading. Underneath him, Sherlock made little whimpering sounds. _Don’t think_ , John commanded to himself, _just feel_. He gazed at Sherlock with half-lidded eyes, over the expanse of his back, his dark head, his hands moving a bit on the sheets, the way the oil had pooled in the small of his back, was trickling down over the sacrum, shiny liquid disappearing into the crevice of his arse.

John paused, hands still warm on those globes of flesh before trailing a finger through the oil and down, very slowly and gently, just between his cheeks, from top to bottom. 

Sherlock inhaled deeply then let it out in a shaky huff.

“Still good?”

“Mmnf.”

 _Jesus,_ thought John. _I could do this. I could spread him apart._ He might have, too, had Sherlock not stopped him.

“Do my feet?” he said.

“What about the ticklish bit?”

“I’ll manage.”

John took a moment to collect himself, his own cock hard and straining against his belly and leaving little smears of pre-ejaculate everywhere, before dismounting and settling at the foot of the bed. 

“Turn over. Scoot up.”

Sherlock did, propping himself up at the head of the bed with pillows before throwing an arm over his eyes and breathing through his mouth, his own member dark and swollen against the pale skin of his stomach. John sat between his legs, re-oiled his hands, took one of those long, slender feet between them, and tried his best to do what James’ magic fingers had done earlier. 

When John’s thumbs played over the arch of his right foot, Sherlock moaned again, but now John could see he was smiling, still with an arm over his eyes. “That _is_ brilliant,” he said. 

“See?”

“No. _Feel_. Don’t stop.”

John wasn’t planning on it, though his hands were getting a bit tired. He spent a few minutes with the right, taking his time with toes, before switching to the left, but after listening to Sherlock moan and watching him writhe around, he couldn’t take it anymore: willpower depleted. 

“Move,” he whispered, and climbed between those long legs. He found the bottle, where it was spilling a bit onto the sheets, poured more into his palms, and began on Sherlock’s upper thighs, rubbing oil into muscles and over tendons, over the tender skin where leg joins body, before leaning down and pressing his face into Sherlock’s groin. 

He waited a moment, making sure everything was still fine by Sherlock, before sticking his nose directly into Sherlock’s scrotum and inhaling deeply. Sherlock’s smell _was_ arousing, thought John, and not that much different from a woman’s, a bit musky, a bit yeasty, a bit spicy, and right now, all sex. He worried the thin skin with his tongue, tasting, sucking a bit, letting his mouth find the root of Sherlock’s penis, nestled deep between the testes. 

Above him, Sherlock sighed, and John felt his fingers rest on his head for a moment.

John replaced his mouth with his slippery hands, tenderly, very gently massaging Sherlock’s sac and its delicate contents before letting his fingers wander lower, over his perineum, where they gently stroked and pressed. Shedding the last of his trepidation, John kept the one hand busy while the other found and guided Sherlock’s shaft to his lips.

Somewhere above him, Sherlock swore, a fluent string of filthy words. John would have smiled if he could have, but, for the first time in his life, he had a cock in his mouth.

Quickly realizing that he couldn’t take in the whole thing, much less half of it, without gagging, John changed positions, wrapping his left hand hand around the base of Sherlock’s penis and concentrated on the glans instead, licking and swiping his tongue around, tasting salt and skin. He thought about what he liked and tried to do the same, moving his hand in rhythm to the bobbing of his head as he tried a bit of suction. This, too, elicited a few choice words from his lover, whose legs were now moving a bit as he tried to keep his hips still.

John decided then and there, his tongue poking at the slit, that he really enjoyed performing oral sex on a man as much as he did to a woman. Well, to Sherlock, at least. He was going to need to practise a bit, find a way to relax his jaw, and then his throat, but there was plenty of time for that.

He had to let his right hand abandon Sherlock’s testicles in favor of leverage, and soon he found himself simply _needing_ to be touched. He came up for air, wiping his mouth a bit on the back of his oily hand, before he was bodily hauled up the bed and soundly kissed, Sherlock’s mouth hot, wet, and still tasting of smoky whisky.

Sherlock was visibly shaking when they parted, lips wet and flushed. “John,” he said, voice gravelly and deep as his hips thrust up against John’s, “I need more. I want...I want to...oh God.”

“What do you want?”

Sherlock closed his eyes as if it were painful to express just what he was feeling. He released the words quickly, before he could retract them. “I want to _consume_ you. I want you inside of my body; I want to know that my very cellular respiration is being fuelled by you, by cells from your body; I want to _absorb_ you. I want our bones to fuse together. I want...”

Sherlock stopped abruptly, opening and focusing his eyes. He was instantly terrified, a look John had only seen in those eyes once before. “Oh God. That’s...that’s not the right thing to say, is it?. I meant...” His face flushed, his eyes lowered, and for a moment John was sure he was going to climb off the bed and hide in the bathroom.

John held him, smiled, and kissed his worry away. Sherlock would never feel embarrassed about his feelings, those precious feelings, not on John’s watch. “I know,” he whispered. “I know. That’s love, Sherlock. Love. You’re supposed to feel that way.”

“It’s...I can’t...How do people _cope_ with this?”

“Shhh.” John stilled his body and simply lay on Sherlock for a long while, their arousal still hot and heavy between them, but calmed somewhat, as Sherlock searched for his bearings in an unfamiliar landscape. He had seemed so confident a few hours ago, but now, lost in emotion, he needed time. 

John was, if anything, a very patient man.

“It’s all tangled,” Sherlock said at length, whispering into John’s neck. 

“Connected,” corrected John, lifting up his head to kiss Sherlock’s perfect mouth some more, running his tongue over that impossible cupid’s bow. How did a man even _get_ lips like that? John wondered what they’d look like wrapped around his cock. Gorgeous. Fucking gorgeous.

“I want to have sex,” Sherlock announced, his eyes crossing a bit as he tried to make eye contact with their faces so close together. “Sex, John. Making love. Intercourse. Fucking. All of that. Right now.” 

It was John’s turn to pause a bit. Oh God. _Fucking Sherlock Holmes._ Quick and dirty, or soft and tender? In his aroused and slightly drunken state, either sounded fantastic. What about a bit of both?

“I meant what I said, earlier,” continued Sherlock. “I want to taste you. I want to suck you off. But right now, I think...” he swallowed, “sex.”

John closed his eyes and counted his heartbeats. “What do you...are you usually...?” He didn’t know any better way to put it. John really didn’t know the vernacular of gay sex. “Top or bottom?” he managed to get out. He didn’t want to force Sherlock into something he would find distasteful or wasn’t used to. When he realized that penetrative sex was likely on the agenda for the weekend, John decided he would be all right with anything. Being penetrated would be...different (he’d had a tip of a finger once during a particularly spectacular blow job and that hadn’t been uncomfortable in the slightest), but the idea of being filled by Sherlock, having that beautiful cock stuffed inside of him, filling him up - well, he could deal with that.

Sherlock smiled, crisis averted. The tension dissolved. 

“I’m what they call _versatile_ ," he replied, waggling his eyebrows a bit. “Whatever feels right. You and your labels.” He found John’s hand and kissed the tips of his fingers. “It’s been a very long time. Right now, I think you should touch me. Use that oil on your fingers.” The slightly devious look was back, the one that made John catch his breath. “Open me,” he murmured. “Get me ready for you.”

And then, as if John’s heart couldn’t beat any faster, Sherlock rather _presented_ himself, situating himself back down on the bed a bit, spreading his bent knees and drawing them up, and John saw _everything_. John gulped in air and tried to calm down.

“Jesus, you’re gorgeous,” he croaked out, amazed that such a sight sent his blood to boiling. He was going to say that he didn’t know what to do, but he _did_ , somehow. Using his fingers seemed to be too medical to start, and he still had Sherlock’s taste on his tongue. Sherlock had told him earlier that he was brave. Might as well prove it. “Here,” he said, sliding off the bed and trying to pull Sherlock’s lower half with him. “Put yourself - here. Yes.” 

Sherlock’s eyes widened, having figured it out, and his mouth fell open. John could see his pulse beating in his throat. But he did it, and as John kneeled next to the bed, heaving Sherlock’s long legs over his shoulders, he began to tremble. 

“Shhh,” John whispered. “It’s OK. Relax.” He took one long look at what was laid out before him, Sherlock’s most intimate of parts, his anus, tight and puckered, nestled in soft hair. _I can’t believe I’m going to do this_ , John thought to himself, _but so help me, I want to_. He closed his eyes, leaned in, breathed through his nose (sharp, sweet, earthy, musky, incredibly sexual underneath the perfume of the oil) and kissed.

He’d always thought of oral sex with a woman as kissing of sorts, a skill, an art, every woman different. Here, on his knees with the weight of Sherlock’s heels digging into his back, he kissed: mouthing what skin he could reach, running his tongue over the tight skin of the perineum, around the muscles of the anus, lapping, licking, teasing. 

“Oh, hell,” moaned Sherlock from somewhere up on the bed. “Fucking hell. Oh John.”

John’s mouth was too occupied to respond, but he was filled with knowledge that he had complete control over Sherlock at the moment, the man who never trusted anyone but himself, the man who loathed the touch of others, was allowing him to perform this most intimate of acts... That knowledge was electric, heady. 

John kept at it, gently, holding Sherlock’s legs open with his hands. Under his tongue, he could feel the tight muscles begin to relax, and he added a bit more pressure, occasionally tucking the tip of his tongue just inside the opening. It wasn’t long before Sherlock was bucking his hips and thrashing about and then unwraping his legs and pushing John away a bit. John sat back on his heels and wiped his mouth. His face was covered with oil and spit and he probably looked a right mess. Apparently, this didn’t bother Sherlock in the slightest, who sat up, cupped John’s face between those large hands, gazed at it adoringly for a long moment, before kissing him again. With tongue. 

_Well,_ thought John. _Not squeamish either._

“Get back up here,” demanded Sherlock when they broke apart for air. “Get up here and fuck me.”

Roger that. 

“How?” John asked, hoping Sherlock could figure it out. He was rather beyond coherent speech. 

“On my back. I want to see you, this first time.”

John thought about condoms (he didn’t have any) and realized their integrity would be entirely compromised by the oil that Sherlock was pouring into his hands anyway. Sighing into Sherlock’s touch, John watched as those long fingers liberally coated his cock, and then he watched, mesmerised, as Sherlock oiled his own penis before sliding over his balls and down. Two slick fingers disappeared inside his body, and John tried not to come right then and there. Sherlock worked at himself for moment, eyes closed and head thrown back, before deciding it was time. He opened his eyes enough to encourage John that yes, this was what they both wanted and needed, before reaching for John and guiding his cock. 

“In,” he murmured. “Slowly. Let me feel you.”

Breathing deeply, trying to tamp down a building orgasm, John pushed, felt resistance, looked for reassurance, found it, and kept going. It was so tight - John was afraid of hurting Sherlock, and watched him carefully for signs of pain - but the oil helped and then John was _in_ , the head of his penis having fully passed that tight ring of muscle, and moments later, he was fully sheathed. John had never had a panic attack from joy or lust before, but right now, he was close to hyperventilating. _Jesus H. Christ._

Then, Sherlock was leaning up to meet him for a kiss, and they rearranged limbs with a quick exchange of shy smiles until everything was lined up properly.

“Incredible,” breathed John. “You all right?”

Sherlock rolled his eyes back into his head and flopped back down. Then he _squeezed_ those muscles and John’s vision nearly went white. 

“Oh, yes,” he said. “Just...give me a minute.”

He could have as many minutes as he needed. John looked down, between them, seeing Sherlock’s cock, hard and nearly purple between them, his balls nestled up against John’s pubic bone. Oh God. They were _joined_. And if John moved up just a bit, like that, he could see where his cock disappeared, the stretch of skin surrounding him. 

He had to close his eyes. If he watched that, saw his prick sliding in and out, shiny with oil - nope. No can do.

It wasn’t long before their bodies simply couldn’t wait - a slow rhythm of rocking hips at first became a gentle but steady thrusting. John felt sweat form on his brow.

“I’m fine,” Sherlock whispered. “Christ, John. I can feel you in me, so hard. So...hot. You’re so beautiful. More.” He reached his own hand down between them to touch himself, softly at first. John had to change positions a bit to accommodate him. He’d begun to rotate his hips a bit on every thrust in, encouraged by the grunts of pleasure Sherlock was making. John had known Sherlock would be vocal in bed, but there was something so masculine, nearly animal in nature - not the breathy pants or orgasmic screams of a woman, but the sounds of a man lost in the throes of pleasure. Just thinking about it would get John hard years into the future: Sherlock’s own sex soundtrack.

When John finally felt he wouldn’t hurt his lover, he no longer tried to hold it back, and he thrust in earnest, holding to whatever part of Sherlock he could grip - a hand, a thigh. Gone was his precision. He was vaguely aware of his own vocalisations as he pumped his hips. The entire universe had shrunk down to this room, this bed, these two men, flesh slapping against flesh as their bodies learned one another, pleasured one another, loved one another. 

Sherlock’s feet were scrabbling for purchase on the bed now, his heels digging in, before his eyes snapped open and his hand began to jerk himself in earnest. 

“Oh, I’m _coming!_ " he cried, as if taken by surprise, and then he did, semen missing his hand and flying across his chest. John could feel it from the _inside_ , the pulse and flutter of muscles, and then he, too, was gone. One last tremendous thrust and he came, as far into Sherlock as he could. 

_Have me,_ was his last coherent thought. _Absorb me. It’s all for you._ He may have even said it aloud, an ‘I love you’ in a language Sherlock could understand.

_______________________________________

When he could breathe properly again, John pulled out, carefully, feeling horrible at Sherlock’s wince, before wrapping himself up in sweaty, oily, messy limbs. The bed was indeed wrecked, the sheet having come off the top corner and now stained with oil, sweat, and come. John didn’t necessarily mind sleeping in a patina of sex emissions, but thought that Sherlock might want to wash.

Eventually they shared a sleepy shower, gently soaping each other, saying little but enjoying the simple, surprisingly easy companionship. John let Sherlock stay in longer, figuring hot water and a little privacy might be needed. He wrapped himself in a towel, and while his lover finished in the bathroom, John found clean linen in the antique wardrobe, stripped and remade the bed. 

“We’re just going to mess it all up again,” said Sherlock, emerging from the bathroom as John finished the precise corners. 

“Sorry. Habit.”

“Hmmm.” Sherlock kissed him, tasting of toothpaste, before shedding his own towel and climbing into bed. “Come, John. Sleep with me.”

John smiled and looked fondly at his beautiful, strange, amazing lover. “I don’t know. Do you steal the covers?” he asked cheekily as he settled in beside him.

Sherlock shrugged as he rolled over to his side and pulled John behind him. John found it odd to be spooning someone so much taller than he was, his cheek nestled in to Sherlock’s back. 

“I don’t know. I’ve never slept with anyone before.”

John knew he meant it literally. Sherlock wasn’t a virgin, that much was for sure. But as far as being loved? Having sex be an act of love? John knew, without a doubt, that this evening, for all intents and purposes, was Sherlock’s first time. So John held him, breathed deeply, and fell asleep smiling.

_________________________________

Except that sleeping with Sherlock was much like sleeping with a hungry octopus. 

Eventually, hot and sweaty under the covers, John had moved away from Sherlock’s side, only to be found again by long arms and legs, and for a good hour or so they rolled around, both half asleep, trying to figure out the logistics of the thing. 

John awoke too early, finding Sherlock’s erection nestled happily in the space between his thighs and buttocks. He pressed back, experimentally, and found that this, too, could be fruitful. 

Half an hour later the sheets needed to be changed again, but they were both so tired that they separated to either side of the giant bed, leaving the mess between them in favor of slumber.

They both slept like the dead until mid-morning.

________________________________________

 

John awoke to the sound of Sherlock’s phone, which appeared to be having some kind of seizure on the table. He yawned, stretched himself out a bit, and retrieved it, lobbing in Sherlock’s direction. 

Sherlock was face-down on the bed, face mashed against the mattress, his pillow lost on the floor. 

“Hey. Hey, Sherlock. Wake up.”

“Mmmnnfffn.”

“You’ve missed six texts and two calls.”

Sherlock said something sleepy and muffled about being on holiday. 

John climbed back onto the bed, pulled the covers off Sherlock and replaced them with himself. “I bet Lestrade’s team is here. Let’s get up. Have breakfast.” John trailed a hand down Sherlock’s back and side, then sat up a bit and looked at his arse. Still perfect. Memories of what he _did_ to that particular piece of anatomy came floating back to him, and he blushed a bit.

“You order breakfast. Not hungry.”

Just then, a sharp rap at the door startled them both. John dove under the covers as Sherlock sat up; their skulls nearly colliding in the process. 

“Sherlock Holmes!” came a familiar voice through the door. “I trust you’ve had an eventful evening. Now get dressed before I come in and collect you.”

John giggled a bit as Sherlock’s expression shifted from extreme annoyance to devious mirth, sleepiness gone.

“Go away, Mycroft,” Sherlock yelled in the door’s direction. “I am currently engaging in rather spectacular coitus.” 

Sherlock looked at John, and made an encouraging face. _Do something,_ he mouthed. 

Feeling awfully twelve for a moment, John bounced on the bed a bit and said, “Oh, Sherlock,” as convincingly as he could muster without laughing. 

“Yes, John!” Sherlock cried back, eyeing the door.

“You have ten minutes,” said Mycroft.

Gray-green eyes met dark blue, and the walls of Willow Cross’ premium honeymoon suite rang with childish laughter. 

“Oh, grow up, Sherlock,” John said, wiping his eyes.

“You first,” replied Sherlock, eyes dancing. He climbed back across the bed to take John’s face in his hands again, eyes searching and apparently finding what they were looking for. “John,” he said. “My John.” 

And then he was off, dressing in typical Sherlock fashion, all words and manic energy. 

_My John._ He very much liked the sound of that.

_______________________________________

John rather felt like he had a giant sign above his head, blinking “We’ve Just Had Incredible Sex” in red neon. He and Sherlock had not come down from the honeymoon suite holding hands or giggling, neither of them had love bites (he’d checked, twice, just to make sure), and neither of them was walking crooked. Yet when he and Sherlock approached the table on the veranda where the local CID Inspector, Lestrade, Mycroft and Phillip Leybourne were taking tea, the four of them stopped and stared. John could imagine the thoughts in each of their heads:

Lestrade: ‘Bout fucking time, mate.

Mycroft: You’re welcome, little brother.

Phillip Leybourne: Good gracious. Is that what they do in London these days? Book into honeymoon suites and bugger each other?

Local CID: What the hell is going on here?

Sherlock was completely nonplussed. He swung a chair around, sat in it, crossing his legs, and smirking at his brother a moment before addressing Mr. Leybourne.

“I’m terribly sorry about Ms. Gleason and your son,” he said as John pulled up a chair for himself.

 

“I just can’t seem to take it all in,” lamented Mr. Leybourne, whose hand seemed a bit shaky around his teacup. “She was such a lovely girl. And all the while, she and Robert...arrested for manslaughter...” His nose turned red, and for an instant John was sure he was going to cry again. Sherlock did _not_ do well with tears. “Right under my nose, in my very own home!” 

“I’m sorry, my friend,” said Mycroft, who did seem genuinely apologetic “I had not wanted to mention anything to you until I was sure something was indeed amiss. It was not my intent to ruin you.”

“Oh, I know,” Leybourne sniffed. “I just can’t see how I’ll manage now. The WC will be national news: we will have to close so that the police can continue their investigations. The business won’t survive a brouhaha like this, I can tell you. I’ll have to sell up, and then what will become of the poor, poor horses.”

“Not necessarily,” replied the elder Holmes, fingers steepled under his nose exactly the way Sherlock did. John wondered how many of Mycroft’s idiosyncracies Sherlock picked up in his youth. “Sometimes scandal can be quite good for business. I’ll do what I can.” 

“But even if we do survive, how will we cope? I’ll never find another manager like Lillian.”

“Navya Kapur,” said Sherlock.

“Who?” asked Leybourne. John tried not to roll his eyes.

“Navya Kapur,” Sherlock repeated, sighing in annoyance. “She works on the reception desk. Highly underutilised. If I were you, I would promote her on the spot.”

Leybourne looked like he was trying to recall his employee’s face. “You would?”

“Indeed.” 

John nodded when Leybourne looked to him for assurance. 

“In fact,” Sherlock continued, “she’s likely to be on duty now. You should go and talk to her.” His voice suggested he leave immediately, and the poor man looked to Mycroft for guidance. 

“My brother lacks tact, but his advice is sound. I’ll meet you momentarily.” 

Leybourne excused himself and fumbled his way out of the garden. The Inspector officer, a man whose name, John remembered, was Campbell, declared he was had everything needed, shook hands with Lestrade, and said he’d be in touch, before he, too, excused himself.

There were a long few minutes where the two Holmes brothers engaged in an entire mental conversation to which John was not privy. 

“So you...” John began to say to Lestrade, when he was interrupted by a quick exchange of bizarre conversation:

“Yes,” said Sherlock.

“No,” replied Mycroft.

“When did you...”

“It was necessary...”

“Government business...”

“600 thread count...”

“Horses...”

“Ridiculous...”

“Grand Prix”

“Expenditures!”

“STOP!” yelled John and Lestrade at the same time. The two brothers paused, apparently at a standstill. 

“Jesus,” said Lestrade. “Are they always like this?”

“Yes, more or less,” replied John. “I think what Sherlock’s trying to say,” he said to Holmes the elder, "is, um, thank you. For, yeah. The lovely weekend.”

“That is _not_ what I’m trying to say at all, John,” grumbled Sherlock, irritated. 

“You are very welcome, Dr. Watson,” said Mycroft, smiling over his tea. 

“You two, uh...” Lestrade took a good long look at both Sherlock and John before leaning back in his chair. “Damn,” he finally settled on.

“What, did you lose the office sweepstake?” quipped Sherlock. John slapped him on the shoulder. 

“Might have won it, actually,” laughed Lestrade. “Pretty messed up case, though, eh?” he asked, changing the subject as a waiter approached with a tray of pastries and fruit. Sherlock grabbed an apple and bit into it as aggressively as he could. Only Sherlock could make the simplicity of eating an apple into an act of hostility. 

“It seems it was Robert’s idea,” said John, buttering a croissant. “With the needles. She was going to introduce acupuncture as a spa package and thought that perhaps the drug could help patients. I don’t think she really understood how dangerous it actually was.”

“Well,” said Lestrade, “it was certainly dangerous for Brian Holleran.”

“Was he taking antidepressants?”

“I don’t know yet. I’ll have to check with his girlfriend; confirm with Molly.” 

“That could have caused the overdose. In such small doses it causes euphoria and induces addiction, but if he were already taking a SSRI, whatever’s on those needles may have created lethal levels.”

“Robert Leybourne had to have known the risks,” said Sherlock, having paused his deliberate crunching. “I’ll be interested to know exactly what else he’s been working on.”

“I’ll look into it,” said Mycroft. He looked for all the world perfectly at home.

“That was nice,” John said to Sherlock, “about Navya.”

“It’s true. Leybourne would never see her potential without encouragement. Idiot.”

“He’s remarkable with the horses,” added Mycroft. 

“How _do_ you know the man, anyhow?” asked John.

“Dressage,” said Sherlock, biting what was left of his apple. He’d figured it all out, then.

“What?”

“Dressage,” continued Mycroft. “The highest art of horse training.” 

“ _Horse ballet_ ,” said Sherlock derisively.

“Horse ballet?” Lestrade leaned forward.

“Mycroft’s childhood dream. Olympic Grand Prix Dressage. My brother is quite at home with a giant beast between his legs.”

If Lestrade had had a mouthful of tea, John was sure it would have come flying out at the moment.

“Oh, shut up,” replied Mycroft primly. “Apparently, you are too.”

“OK,” said John, holding up his hands, “that’s quite enough.” He was _not_ going to be a part of this.

“You like horses? I love them!” exclaimed Lestrade, much to Sherlock and John’s surprise. “My uncle used to own a riding school, and we’d spend the summer holidays exercising the ponies. No dressage though. Bit public school, that.”

He must have felt the questioning stare of three people, for he cleared his throat. 

John watched something change in Mycroft’s eyes; he _did_ observe, contrary to what Sherlock believed. The the elder Holmes was looking at Lestrade, well, differently. John would have to ask Sherlock about it later. It only lasted a moment, however, before Mycroft deposited his napkin on the table and stood. 

“Gentlemen, I bid you a lovely afternoon. It seems that when one crisis is resolved, another arises to take its place. John. Sherlock.”

He held his brother’s eyes for what John thought was a small eternity, before the younger Holmes sighed and made a face. Mycroft must have interpreted the expression favourably, for he smiled and nodded as if to say “you’re welcome” before sauntering his way off the veranda, umbrella tapping on the flagstones, presumably to find Leybourne. 

“Well,” said Greg, “I’d best be heading back to London. Got everything I need while you two were, er, having a lie-in, and I think the team’s about done inside for today. We’ll run tests on the samples and see exactly what we’ve got.” 

Lestrade picked up his jacket from where he’d hung it over the back of his chair and shrugged it on. “You staying?”

“For the rest of the day,” replied Sherlock. “I’d like to have a look around the village.”

He looked at John for approval, who shrugged his shoulders. It didn’t matter to him. He actually didn’t know how they were getting home, and found he didn’t really care.

“I’ll be in touch.” Lestrade leaned over, grabbed one more grape off the tray, and popped it in his mouth. He winked at John, then turned to go.

“Lestrade?” Sherlock had remembered something, apparently. “Brian Holleran. Exotic dancer?”

“No. Ha! Why?”

“What about his hair?”

“Lack of,” corrected John.

“Oh! Yeah. Nearly forgot. Found out from the girlfriend yesterday. Turns out he’s got some crazy form of alopecia. Genetic. Odd, ‘cause it doesn’t seem to trouble his head, and its usually the other way around. It’s an extremely rare condition.” 

“So,” said John, “his lack of hair had nothing do to with his death.”

“Nope. None whatsoever. Hey - do you know why Molly calls him ‘Mr. Considerate Lover?’ Thought that was a bit out of order. I mean, the poor girl’s a bit socially awkward, but that’s a bizarre nickname to give to a corpse.”

“No idea,” said Sherlock, shrugging. John tried his best to look blank.

Greg gave him an odd look, then nodded at John in a sort of congratulatory way, and headed out. 

“Oh, and Sherlock,” he remembered, turning back, “I’ve got to get a bottle of that shampoo!”

John smiled apologetically when they were alone. “Sorry. He noticed.”

“Well, of course he did. That cheap concoction you were using left a silicone coating all over your hair, making it dull and heavy. My shampoo removed the residue.”

“You have an unhealthy obsession with hair,” John teased, finding Sherlock’s foot under the table and nudging it with his shoe. 

“So you don’t want to know how long it will be until you’re completely grey?”

“How could you possibly know that? And no, I don’t. It’s bad enough as it is. I’m not an old man.”

“I wrote an algorithm based on the number I found when I was...researching.”

“You did not.”

Sherlock shrugged and shoved his foot back, smiling cryptically as he took a sip of his tea, which had obviously gone cold.

Around them, the birds sang, the breeze blew, and life continued much as normal, except two men living at 221 B Baker Street had left as friends and were returning as lovers.

“You want to stay?” John asked, stretching a bit and simply enjoying himself. "I’m afraid that you’ll be bored in another hour.”

“No. I meant it. Let’s go into the village and poke around a bit. Then we’ll head home.” He leaned forward a bit conspiratorially. “I believe there’s a bed to ruin there, too.” 

“Oh,” said John. “I think there’s two.”

“No. Just one.”

___________________________________

“John,” said Sherlock as they lay together on Sherlock’s bed, exhausted and blissed out, John having surrendered himself to his lover’s desires; Sherlock had been gentle and surprisingly patient. John was a bit sore and felt like he’d been buggered seven ways from Sunday (well, more like three), but he was completely sated and utterly happy. 

“Hmm?” he murmured, listening to the night sounds of London and Sherlock’s breathing. It felt strange, being in Sherlock’s room instead of his own, but the bed was comfortable and it felt so good to be home.

Sherlock was running his fingers over John’s temple, smoothing away sweat and moving his hair off his brow. “You’ve got five years. Until it’s all gray.”

“Fuck you, you bastard. I didn’t want to know!” John shoved him a bit, playfully but without much force; he was too tired.

“I have twenty, at the least.”

“Good for you. Shit. Five? Really? I’ll look like someone’s damn grandfather at forty-six.”

“Those cardigans will have to go.”

“No way. Do not interfere with my clothes, Sherlock.”

“Except to remove them?”

“Exactly.”

John let Sherlock play with his hair a bit more, and then was suddenly rather worried. “Will it bother you? To be seen with me? Old, decrepit Grandpa John? Will you still find me attractive?”

Sherlock made a scoffing sound. “Your body is secondary, John. While I fully enjoy every inch of it, I loved you long before I dared touch it.”

“So sentimental,” John laughed. “No, really. Bodies age. Minds can be lost. Spirits can be broken.”

“You’re thinking again. Stop that.”

John quieted and let Sherlock wrap himself around him, tucking his curly head into the crook of John’s neck. 

“What you really want to know is, how long this will last. Truthfully, I cannot tell you. I have no prior experience in such matters. It has been nearly a decade since my prior sexual activities, and the men I have taken to bed were nothing to me. A means to an end. I have shared my body but never my mind. With you, John, I shall share everything. I believe I already have. But I have much to learn, and I am a obstinate pupil, even with the most patient of instructors.”

John smiled at this. So true.

“What I’ve observed about relationships,” Sherlock continued, “is that most of them change. I suppose we’ve gone about things rather backward. There are important things we ought to discuss. But not now. I find myself feeling rather satisfied with life at the moment, and I just want to exist. Here, with you. Ruminating about the future is pointless, John, and only breeds worry. The point is, we’re here now. You know I do not believe in fate or soulmates or any other such nonsense. I’ve _chosen_ you. And I’ll be yours as long as you’ll have me.”

Finding himself a bit overwhelmed with emotion, John ran his fingers through Sherlock’s curls. 

“Thank you,” he said, because he could find nothing else to say. Sherlock nudged a bit closer, pressing his naked body into John’s. John trailed his free arm down the lines of Sherlock’s bicep, over the sinews of his forearm, and linked their hands together. Sherlock’s hand was so much larger than his own, another reminder that his lover was, indeed, a man. A man with smooth skin, morning stubble, an adam’s apple, hair under his arms, large eyebrows, and a really lovely penis. Inside that man was an incredibly brilliant brain and, somewhere in there, a heart, a heart that now beat in time with his own. 

Their relationship, John knew, would be far from idyllic. They were still John and Sherlock. They would fight. They would solve crimes. They would walk in Regent’s Park. They would get into trouble. They would bicker like an old married couple, share an amazing friendship, and comfort each other in times of need. They would fuck; they would make love. Their relationship would baffle everyone except the ones who knew them best, and they would give it their blessing. 

Maybe they would grow old together. Maybe John would write, and Sherlock would keep bees. Maybe.

John thought for a long time, until a soft snore from the man half-lying on him drew him back to Baker Street. Sherlock had actually fallen asleep. His muscles occasionally twitched, involuntary little sleep movements, and the beginnings of an erection swelled against John’s thigh. John found it both comforting and endearing. His mind quieted and his thoughts retreated. 

In a dark room in a London flat, John Watson, doctor, soldier, and lover, vowed to love Sherlock Holmes the best he could, for as long as he could. 

How easy was it, then? He simply loved the man. Mind, soul...and body.

 

~Finis

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THANK YOU EVERYONE for following along, and, for the final time, to my beta and hopefully now friend, BettySwallocks, who really did so much work on this. Amazing how two characters can draw two random people together across an ocean.
> 
> Also, I have a tumblr, with the same username. Follow for updates and links to what I'm working on now. Don't forget to author subscribe so you don't miss out! 
> 
> Thanks to everyone for your kind comments and for following along. You made it all worth it!


	12. Extras

I should have put the extras in with the fic, but didn't, and am now regretting it.

If you subscribed to CH, I'm letting you know here that there are a few extra bits and pieces of the story that are posted [ Here. ](http://archiveofourown.org/series/62148) Enjoy!

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Cover for Corpus Hominis](https://archiveofourown.org/works/873831) by [moonblossom graphics (moonblossom)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/moonblossom/pseuds/moonblossom%20graphics)
  * [[Podfic] Corpus Hominis by mycapeisplaid](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1171867) by [AxeMeAboutAxinomancy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AxeMeAboutAxinomancy/pseuds/AxeMeAboutAxinomancy)




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